Reassembled
by Loquatorious
Summary: With each of the original six going their separate ways, it's up to Sam Wilson, the new Captain America, to assemble a new team of heroes from across the globe. Alongside him are his two teammates Bucky Barnes, The White Wolf, and Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch, still recovering from the loss of Vision. The Avengers will rise again! Sequel to Homebound.
1. Chapter 1

_**SUMMARY**_

_**With each of the original six going their separate ways, it's up to Sam Wilson, the new Captain America, to assemble a new team of heroes from across the globe. Alongside him are his two teammates Bucky Barnes, now dubbed The White Wolf, and Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch herself, still recovering from the loss of Vision. Battles will occur, romances will blossom, and the Avengers will rise again.**_

**It's a new world out there. It's time to bring together a new group of remarkable people to protect it. And Barnes, too.**

* * *

__"Being a leader is a delicate act to pull off. You've got to always be thinking about your team, about their needs, their strengths, their weaknesses, how they can be used and how they can endanger the mission at any given point. You've got to be what they need you to be; they're relying on you to know how to proceed, even when nobody else does. Sometimes, you won't know. Sometimes, you'll find yourself backed against a wall with no way out, faced with too many choices at once, and none of them good. I've encountered that myself, plenty of times, and no matter how often I find myself up against that wall, you're never, ever prepared for it. At that point, you can't think about all the variables. You have to focus in on what you know, and that point all you know is you. That's why, as much as it's essential to trust your team, it's just as important to trust yourself. You have to show them why you're on the front line. So that when you find yourself against that wall, you can throw yourself in any direction, do anything that will take you that one step closer to an answer, and know that the others will follow you no matter what.__

__"You see, Sam, that's the root of it. That's how I was able to run headfirst towards the end of the world. It was never about courage, or strength, or ability, or identity. It's about faith. Faith, in yourself, and in the people around you, will take you further than you ever thought possible. The tricky part is earning that faith, and that can only happen through time and a hell of a lot of patience. But keep at it, because it's worth it. Cherish every moment of it."__

That was the very last piece of advice that Steve Rogers, former Captain America had given Sam Wilson, the New Captain America, before he, and his fiancée Natasha, had departed through the quantum realm to their home in the past. Honestly, when Sam had asked for advice, he thought he just going to get some old fortune cookie phrase like "Eat your vegetables" or "Make sure to wax the shield," or "Wanda's favourite cereal is coco puffs." He didn't expect an entire speech on the subject. He starting to wish he had written it down somewhere.

Sam was going to miss Steve, as was Barnes, as was Wanda, as was everyone who had ever worked with him. He was going to miss Natasha too, but most people - save a very select few - thought she was dead, sacrificed herself to save the universe. They had offered to spread the truth about her return, but it was actually Natasha who protested, saying that her legally-dead status made her job all the easier if she ever decided to return to the espionage business. The remaining members of the original Avengers team were all on the shortlist of people who knew the truth (except for Clint, to whom Steve and Nat said they would deliver the news personally), along with Sam, Bucky, Wanda and Pepper. All the people who knew her best.

Steve's cover story was that he had 'retired'. Simple but effective. Death would have the world clamouring for a body and a funeral. Official retirement would have people scouring through records to try and find him. Keeping it vague was the best way of covering his tracks, neither confirming nor denying his fate. 'Retirement' was definitely the best way of framing it.

But, hey, as far as retirements went, Steve's didn't look too bad. He had more than earned it, anyway. They both had.

As for Sam, well, he had work to do.

Sure, they had saved the world, defeated the big bad, restored relative order to the planet after it was jacked up by the snap, but the Earth was far from peaceful. Power vacuums suddenly being filled. Governments with vast influxes of population. An ungodly amount cleaning up to do. And, with the original Avengers all going their separate ways, new meta-humans eyeing the big leagues.

The world still needed the Avengers, and it was up to Sam Wilson to build it all back up again.

He already had Barnes and Maximoff ready and willing to fight, and they were heavy hitters in their own rights. A little rough around the edges, a few inner demons, but they were superheroes, so that was pretty much a given. Rhodey had also decided to remain on the team, just as he always had. He told them all, with no hint of doubt that his place was in the line of duty. Sam could respect that. That still only added up to four, however. At most, they only had two-thirds of a team. So, Sam had inevitably found himself asking, who else was out there ready to fill the ranks?

He had compiled a list of all the currently active heroes operating on or around Earth:

Scott Lang and Hope Van Dyne aka Ant-Man and the Wasp - those two usually worked out of San Francisco, dealing mostly in their own matters. However, with Lang joining the team recently to help assemble the infinity stones, and Hope having fought with them in the battle against Thanos, there was a precedent for them being part of the team. Sam put that one down as a maybe.

Peter Parker aka Spider-Man - Sam was still hesitant about allowing a kid on the team. A kid who was incredibly smart and definitely strong, no doubt, but he was still a kid. He had his own future to plan out, not to mention probably school. Again, another maybe.

Carol Danvers aka Captain Marvel - depends on whether she'd be able to hang around. She mostly stuck to the outskirts of the galaxy, helping out other planets that didn't have Avengers of their own. It would be irresponsible to have her on as a regular member, especially when she's needed elsewhere. Maybe they could get her over for the holidays, if they're lucky.

Dr Stephen Strange, the 'Sorcerer Supreme' - was it bad luck to have a witch and a sorcerer on the same team? Employing Strange as a regular would be a real boost to the Avengers. It would put them near on par with the original six, maybe even more so, but Strange had his obligations like everyone else, protecting the multiverse and such. Still, he is local, he is powerful, and he might even be willing to have a semi-regular place on the team.

T'Challa aka the Black Panther - the current ruling monarch of Wakanda… yeah, this would be a tough sell any day. Maybe there could be a case for special occasions, like Carol, but as for a continuous membership, that appeared unfeasible.

Valkyrie - from one monarch to another. However, this one seemed more likely. New Asgard was much smaller than Wakanda and closer as well (relatively speaking). Sam was confident that New Asgard could at least run itself for a few days, maybe even weeks at a time. That gave Valkyrie a lot of room for Avengers missions on the side. Convincing her to take up that second responsibility though was going to be a challenge.

At least they had something to work toward.

It was Wanda who suggested a 'road trip' when Sam had run the list past her, Barnes and Rhodey. It sounded like a pretty good idea. Going round to each person on the list, meeting them on their own terms, offering them a place on the roster. It sounded like a perfect recruitment tactic, and it would also give Sam a chance to get used to representing the team.

Besides, it would also give Barnes plenty of time with Wanda, if he played his cards right.

Ever since the confirmation from his future self - it's a long story - Barnes had ever so subtly been finding more and more time for Wanda in his life. At this stage, it was just friendly conversations, little gestures here or there. Sam had let it happen, simply because it meant that she was distracted from Vision. God, Wanda had it rough. In the span of a few days, she had lost her boyfriend, been dusted (and that was not a pleasant experience, as Sam could very easily recall) and mourned her sister-in-arms Natasha - until obviously, Natasha came back. There were tears shed - maybe a few of his own. Sam could hardly remember seeing Wanda so relieved. She and Natasha had built an incredibly strong bond during their time on the run; in fact, they all had.

During those short couple of years evading the governments of the world, he, Bucky, Steve, Nat and Wanda had become a team all of their own. A group of close friends, watching each other's backs, looking out for one another… Nostalgic would be a strong description of Sam's memories of that time because it was admittedly tense, and often it was rough, but it was nice in its own unique way.

Still, a road trip in a well-kept Quinjet, with warm meals and soft beds sounded like an infinitely more enjoyable experience.

Rhodey volunteered to stay behind and maintain the compound, along with Bruce, whose arm was still recovering. It would be Sam, Bucky and Wanda then, on a trip across the globe to assemble the Avengers once again.

Wanda was looking forward to it.

"I'd love to explore Wakanda some more," she admitted as the three of them loaded their supplies into the jet. "Last time I never got the opportunity. What with…" Her voice trailed off, her eyes downcast. Barnes took the chance to intervene.

"I used to live there," he reminded her, patting her shoulder, offering her a smile. "I could always show you around. In fact, I actually kinda forgot to move out. You could come with me, make a day out of it."

She tried her best smile in return.

"I would like that very much," she replied. She continued levitating the equipment into the plane, leaving Barnes to himself.

"That's nice," Sam called as he strode across the landing pad towards him.

"Hey, look, man, I'm not-"

"Don't worry, don't worry, I'm not here to tell you to stop. You're looking out for her, that's what she needs at the moment. I'm just here to warn you."

"Of what?"

"She doesn't need a boyfriend right now."

Bucky fixed him with a strange stare.

"Look, I know how that sounds," Sam quickly added. "I get it, you're just trying to be nice, 'cause you care about her. That's great, man. Keep doing that."

"Then what are you trying to say?" Bucky challenged indignantly. "I know she misses Vision, don't you think I see that? She's not okay, Sam."

"No, she's not," Sam replied forcefully, "But that doesn't mean she wants your help."

"Then what am I supposed to do? I… I don't want to mess this up, Sam."

"I know," Sam assured him. "Look, before I met Steve I used to help run therapy at the Veterans Affairs, so I know a thing or two about grief. Whether we like it or not, she's gonna be like this for a while. I'm gonna try and put off Wakanda for last, so she can get it out of her system. Show her around the place, give her some love, just don't crowd her, alright, man? The last she needs is someone waiting on her. Be there for her if she needs it, then take a step back. Trust me, she'll appreciate it."

For a moment, Sam could swear Bucky looked genuinely appreciative. It was a nice change of pace from constant bravado.

"You think that'll work," he asked.

"It might, eventually. You're used to waiting around, though, right? You know, 'cause you're a hundred years old?"

"There he is," he sighed sardonically, "I was wondering where he disappeared to."

"Come on, lazy ass," Sam teased, lifting up the box in front of Bucky's feet. "We've got a long journey together. All four of us."

"Four of us?" Bucky asked. He pondered a moment before his eyes widened. "No… no, no, no, we're not bringing that stupid bear!"

"Hell yeah, we are," Sam grinned as he lifted a scuffed, sewn-together, golden teddy bear, garbed in a blue bombardier jacket with red buttons and black domino mask out of one of the boxes waiting on the landing pad. "Bucky Bear's coming with us every step of the way!"

The full-grown human Bucky groaned audibly. The bear was a gift that Steve had bought from a gift shop during their days on the run, and the rest of the team had latched onto it as their unofficial mascot. Nowadays they mostly brought it out because it annoyed Bucky.

A loud gasp was heard from behind Sam.

"Bucky Bear!" Wanda cried fondly, lifting him carefully out of Sam's grasp. "I wondered where he was. Oh, is he coming with us?"

"He is, indeed," Sam nodded to her, turning his smug face slowly towards Barnes, who was now glaring at him barely hidden contempt. "Every step of the way."


	2. Chapter 2

"No."

It had come so bluntly, so forcefully that it felt aking to whiplash. If Sam weren't in the business of facing up metahumans, he might have been stunned.

"Just like that?" he asked. What provoked this extreme reaction was unknown to him. He had only asked the kid to be part of the team. His response made it sound Sam had invited the teen in front of him to commit murder, or something to that effect. The fresh face of one Peter Parker, also known as Spider-Man, remained unmoved.

"Just like that," he parroted back at him. His body was unnaturally stiff for a kid his age, his voice utterly dispassionate

"Kid-"

"I'm not joining the Avengers," Peter insisted. "I've got school, I've got a field trip coming up, I've got the little guy to look out for. Beating up aliens or evil space-lords, that's not my thing."

Peter all but launched himself from the bed, walking over to his desk where his web-shooters sat in organised pieces. Sam sighed.

"We're not saying that you have to join," he assured the kid, "and certainly not right away. All we're saying is that the position is open if you ever decide to swing by."

The teen continued absently tinkering with the wrist gadgets on his desk, undoing and reading the same screw over and over again. Sam could only guess that if Peter made himself look busy, it might convince him to leave.

"I'm not cut out for being an Avenger," Peter mumbled.

"You fought beside us, against Thanos," Sam retorted. "You came recommended by Tony himself."

"Yeah and look how that turned out…" Peter growled as he threw a pellet of web fluid across the room as hard as he could, landing in a pile of laundry. Sam allowed the teen a moment to collect himself. He had inferred just from Tony's notes how the close the pair of them had been. Losing a paternal figure was bound to be hard on anyone. Unfortunately for Peter, this hadn't been the first time. Peter's face flushed. He fumbled his fingers nervously, knowing that he had just crossed a line. "I'm sorry, I'm honoured, really… I just miss him."

He slumped back onto the bed, his head hanging low. Sam leaned over to him, putting his face just about level with Peter's.

"We all do," he said with as a soft as he thought comforting, but not patronising. "I get it. You don't wanna do it, we're not gonna force you. If you ever want in, just give us a call."

The kid didn't meet his gaze, but Sam could tell he heard him. Now was his time to leave. Best to let him think it over. He stood from the wheeled chair that sat beside the bedroom door.

"Besides, the pay's pretty good," Sam added humorously.

It was almost comical how subtly Peter tried to frame his sudden renewed interest.

"Really?" the kid asked.

"Well, you only get royalties if you go public," Sam shrugged. "Legal reasons." Peter sighed, his face fell into a new state of disappointment.

"There's the parker luck for ya," he lamented.

"I get it, man. College is expensive."

"I know, right?"

Sam smiled at the kid. He could why Tony liked him.

"Just so you know," the older man said as he pulled the bedroom door open, "the compound covers living expenses."

The teen gave him a pleading look.

"Don't tempt me, man, I'm trying to keep to my principles here."

* * *

"These wheat cakes are delicious, Mrs Parker," Wanda praised through a mouthful.

"Oh, please, call me May," the matriarch insisted, rolling up her apron and hanging it on a nearby peg. She marched up to the table, where she was currently hosting Wanda and Bucky, the former presently enjoying her neighbourhood-renowned wheat cakes and the latter glancing at his companion with endearment. "You are friends of Peter's, after all."

"Well, 'friends' might be a strong word for it," Bucky added quietly. Before May could bring him up on it, her third guest, Sam, made himself known. Bucky, eager to move the conversation elsewhere, turned in his chair. "Did the kid bite?"

"He doesn't think he's ready," Sam explained with crossed arms.

"Really?" Bucky scoffed. "He did pretty well against the two of us. That ought to be enough."

"It's not about whether he can, it's whether he should," Sam clarified. "Losing Tony hit him pretty hard."

"That certainly sounds like him," May testified solemnly. Sam turned his glance towards her.

"You know any way we can convince him?"

"I'm his aunt, not his agent," she replied. She ignored their disappointment. "It doesn't matter if he can lift a car or not, he's still a kid. He's my kid. He knows more than anyone that the day's coming where he's gonna have to step up. Just let him be a high-schooler for now. He needs time to grow up a little."

Throughout the exchange, Wanda had been curiously silent. It was only now that she chose to break that quiet.

"May, can I talk to him?" she asked politely. May raised an eyebrow.

"What about?"

"I just feel like out of all of us I'll be able to understand him best," she explained honestly.

"Because you can get inside his head?" Sam asked, tapping the side of his forehead. Wanda replied with a scathing glance, which halted his actions. He had the decency to looked slightly ashamed.

"No," she said firmly, "Because I've been where he is."

* * *

'Great job, Peter,' the teen thought to himself, 'insulting the brand new Captain America on his first day. Turning the down the Avengers.' He glanced hesitantly at a framed photo of his Stark industries graduation ceremony. The weight of Tony's gaze, even in print, felt ever present. 'I'm sorry, Mister Stark. I don't think I can do this.'

A knock on his bedroom door dragged him out of his thoughts. He turned, flipping the photo face down onto the desk.

"Yeah, come in," he called. The door opened, and the face of Wanda Maximoff peaked through.

"Hi, Peter," she greeted with a kind smile.

"Hi," he replied, trying desperately to control the sudden jump in his stomach. "Wanda, isn't it?'

"It is," she nodded. "We've never been properly introduced."

"No, I guess we haven't." He shifted awkwardly. "Sorry about-"

"About the airport?" She guessed. She waved it off. "No one holds any grudges. Consider it ancient history."

"You come to try and change my mind?" he asked, pretending to act aloof. "'Cause Sam's already tried to tempt me with a salary, and I can't go back on that without feeling real scummy."

She laughed softly.

"No, Peter, I'm not here to change your mind."

"Then, why are you here?"

She glanced around the room, taking it all in. He suddenly felt very exposed. She eventually gestured to the bed.

"Sit, I want to tell you a story."

He shifted his gaze from the bed, back to her, skittishly.

"Sit," she commanded with no real bite. He jumped anyway, racing to sit on the mattress. She casually followed, seating herself beside him, so that they were amicably close together. "Do you wanna know who I was before I joined the Avengers?" He nodded. "I was kid, barely a few years older than you are now. I didn't know what I was doing. All I knew was that I wanted to make a difference. HYDRA took that, and used it to make into this… I had a twin, Pietro, who went through the same thing. Except somehow they made him really fast. I don't know how, maybe it was inside of him the whole time. When we first met the Avengers, we fought against them, with Ultron. We thought what we were doing was right, we were so sure of it. Then it turned out that Ultron was crazy, that this whole time we had fighting for the wrong side. We turned, fought with the Avengers-"

"At Sokovia?"

She looked at him and nodded sagely.

"At Sokovia."

He stared at her with no small amount of awe.

"Awesome…" he whispered.

"It was," she replied truthfully. "Then I lost Pietro. After the battle, after we beat Ultron and saved everyone, I had no idea what the hell I would do. For a long time, I didn't want to do anything, not without Pietro. I doubted whether I deserved to be an Avenger, after all, I was HYDRA's weapon, their Scarlet Witch. What place did I have alongside heroes? It was Clint who convinced me otherwise. He was the one who showed me the truth."

"Which is?"

She had him in the palm of her hand, a piercing stare rooting his attention firmly on her.

"None of us are perfect. We've all done things we regret. We've all lost people dear to us. That's why we're the Avengers because we fight for them. As long as you're willing to stand up for something greater than yourself, you deserve to be on the team. And doesn't mean we save everyone. We do what we can and trust each other to make it enough."

For one of the few moments in his relatively short life, Peter Parker was speechless.

"Wow…" he exhaled. "You are so cool." He was rewarded with a bright and beautiful smile.

"You wanna hear a secret?" she whispered slyly. She leaned in closer. "I might have practised that a few times."

Peter didn't doubt that.

"It was worth it," he assured her, nodded feverishly.

"Thank you. Come here." She reached her arms around him and brought him into a gentle hug, which he embraced gladly. He felt her thumb stroke across his shoulder blade, it's soothing effects were instantaneous. "I know you miss Tony, and your Uncle too. You've done so well. You're more than your mistakes, Peter Parker. You're Spider-Boy."

His brow furrowed.

"S-Spider-Man," he corrected. Wanda pulled back, revealing her equally confused face.

"Spider-Man?" she repeated sceptically. "Sam told me…" Her confusion was replaced with somewhere between amusement and disappointment. "Nevermind. Point stands. The door's open for you, Pete. When you're ready, we'll be happy to have you."

"Yes, ma'am."

She whacked him on the shoulder.

"It's Wanda, silly."

"Wanda, right, Wanda," he stuttered. "That's gonna be hard to get used to."

"Well, if you join the team, you just might have to," she replied. She rose from her seat and skipped to the door. "Now, my apologies, Mr Parker. I'm afraid there are a couple of boys that need a stern talking to."

"Lucky," he lamented. His eyes widened, his head shot up. "Did I say that out loud?"

Wanda could only nod in pity.

* * *

"Sam?"

His teammate's voice drew his focus away from the pile of wheat cakes stacked in front of him. There, at the edge of the kitchen, stood Wanda, her arms resting by her sides. She did not look happy.

"Mmhmm?" he addressed.

"He's called Spider-Man, not Spider-Boy."

His glanced to his side, where Bucky sat looking equally guilty. Despite themselves, the two burst into barely contained giggles. Wanda could only watch and shake her head as her two fellow Avengers dissolved into hysterics.

"Boys," she called sternly, her hands flashing with red.

"Okay, okay, we're sorry," Bucky was the first collect himself, "But the kid had it coming. How did it go?"

"He's feeling better much now," she assured him. May looked visibly relieved.

"Did you use the speech?" Bucky asked with a smirk.

"The speech?" she asked hesitantly.

"The one you've been practising in the mirror," he teased. She stared at him in shock.

"You heard that?!" she exclaimed in embarrassment. Memories of several private evenings of intense mirror-acting suddenly morphed under a new light. "James!"

"It's a good speech! You should be proud of it," he quickly tried to appease her and failing miserably. Her eyes burned red, punctuating her infamous glare.

"Do you think he's gonna be part of the team?" Sam diverted before a fight could occur. She changed demeanours with unsettling ease.

"One day, maybe" she replied. "I don't think he's averse to it."

"All thanks to you, Wanda," Bucky added. Whether it was a genuine compliment or a further attempt to re-endear himself to her, Sam couldn't tell. "It's a shame we couldn't convince him now."

"It might have helped that he has a little bit of crush on me." May's eyebrows flew to her hairline. "I sensed it as we walked in."

Sam glanced back towards Bucky and was glad he did. He could see the cogs turning in his brain as his face fell and new look of deadpan replaced it. He looked like a schoolboy who had forgotten his homework.

"… You know, what? May's right," he suddenly announced, the sound of his chair scraping along the hardwood floor accentuating his hurried rise from the table. "The kid's only in high school, let's leave him to get the hang of things for now."

"Uh, huh?" Sam sounded unconvinced. Wanda appeared oblivious on the exterior.

"I mean, besides, we've got a long journey to San-Fran, and we've gotta get going if we'll any hope go getting there before sundown. Lots of stuff to do." Sam was tempted to let Bucky carry on rambling his out of this, but he knew they were running behind.

"He's right," he concurred. He savoured the grateful look that spread minutely across Bucky's face. "We need to get going. Thank you so much for your time, May."

"My pleasure, Sam," May replied, shaking his hand, proceeding to do the same for each of her departing guests.

"Do you think you could send the recipe for those wheat cakes?" Wanda all but begged.

"Now, that might be difficult, they are a Parker family secret…" May teased.

"Pleeeaaase?" Wanda asked in a manner that reminded Sam just how young she really was. "They're the best wheat cakes ever! I need more of them in my life."

"Then I guess you're gonna have to come round a visit more often, aren't you? " May laughed. "Although I wouldn't eat too many, they go straight to the hips."

Sam wondered if the brief look in Bucky's eye was him wishing May had relented to Wanda's pleading, or if he shouldn't have eaten so many of those wheat cakes himself. Either way, containing the sudden urge to belt out with laughter was one of the hardest things that Sam had ever had to do. Well, that, and resisting the urge to tease his teammate for the entirety of their trip to 117a Bleecker Street.


	3. Chapter 3

Bleecker Street had not gone as well as Sam had hoped. It turns out Dr Strange wasn't as agreeable as you would think, considering all his help in the final battle, considering his so-called masterplan to assure their victory. Turns out, despite his role as protector of Earth, Dr Stephen Strange was still… very arrogant. Now, if Sam had the power to create portals, fly and generally bend reality to his every whim, his ego would undoubtedly be elevated. But Wanda could do all of those things - okay, not make portals, but besides the point - and she was still a humble and kind young woman.

Strange was hardly humble.

"Can't, I'm afraid," he had replied flippantly to Sam's offer. "My responsibilities as the Sorcerer Supreme require my utmost attention."

'The Sorcerer Supreme'. If what Steve had told him about his little trip through time had been correct, the previous occupant of the Sanctum, the Ancient One, had been just as sensational.

"You guys really take that stuff seriously, huh?" Sam asked, sardonically.

"Our dimension depends on it," Strange explained flatly. "It depends on me. I don't do teams. Thanos was a coalition of motives, hardly likely to be a common thing."

"And helping people, protecting the Earth, that's not motive enough for you?"

At this, Strange had halted his pacing, rounding on Sam with an intense gaze. Clearly, Sam had struck a nerve. Not exactly what Sam had come here to do, but with the sorcerer being as abrasive as he was, sparks were bound to start flying.

"I protect the Earth in ways you couldn't begin to comprehend," he retorted, "in ways that certainly outclass a man with a metal frisbee."

If Strange had expected his jab to sway Sam, he had thought wrong.

"I'm taking that as a 'no', then," Sam said rhetorically, his tone of voice still even, if extremely irritated.

"It seems I'm understood," Strange replied. He turned, his cloak flowing regally behind him.

"Well, if protecting the Earth ever happens to coincide with, you know, protecting the Earth again, should we expect you to drop in?"

"If you ever find yourself in a position where you need my help," he announced, pausing ominously on the staircase that dominating the main hall, "chances are I'll already be there. Don't mistake my refusal for apathy, Wilson."

"Certainly feels like it."

"You can't please everyone, Captain. I suggest you get used to it."

And that was it. It wasn't long after that they left, back to compound, back to the Quinjet for their flight to San Francisco. Perhaps he could have done more, Sam thought as their journey to the east coast began. Perhaps he could have fought harder to convince Strange to join their ranks. They were still only three in number. Two meetings, two candidates, and both times they had left empty-handed. For now, at least. Sam knew they he couldn't possibly expect these people to go all in on such a choice in such a small amount of time, but either, the rejection, especially in the latter case, was frustrating. Maybe, in time, they'll come around, but still… Sam was starting to realise just what Steve had meant by needing a hell of a lot of patience. 'Yeah, who knew that dealing with big personalities could be so difficult?' Sam had scoffed to himself away from the others. And Steve had had it even worse. At Sam didn't have to contend with Stark, Thor and Romanoff in the same room, let alone the same team. At Sam had Bucky and Wanda as moral support.

They had tried talking to Strange, just as he had. They had tried everything, Wanda had even attempted the speech once again. The results were, unfortunately, the same. The guy was set entirely in his ways, determined to remain on duty in the Sanctum. Honestly, considering how much the resilience the guy had, Sam was tempted just to let him hide away in that musty old building for the rest of time. It would be the cowardly route, but if it meant that it would save them from the guy's suffocating sense of self, then it almost seemed worth it.

Sam shook his head tiredly, extinguishing that trail of thought. No; as much as Strange was lacking in manners or humility, the wizard had his reasons for staying out of the limelight. Steve wouldn't have disregarded the guy simply because of a stubborn sense of duty, so neither would he. Sam had met veterans with inflated egos, wounded pride and lack of people skills before. He knew that people handled life differently. Being Captain America didn't give him an automatic right to their time, he reminded himself. If he didn't want to be an Avenger, so be it.

Looking out onto the rapidly diminishing horizon, Sam took a moment to reflect on the rest of their journey. Their first stop would be San Francisco, where they would meet up with Scott Lang and the elusive Wasp. Then they were scheduled to turn right back around and go straight to Norway, specifically New Asgard, to meet with Valkyrie. Wakanda would be the final stop on their world-tour, home to the Black Panther himself. That's four more possible Avengers. Possible being the key word.

And here he was thinking the hardest of leading the Avengers was learning how to use the shield.

* * *

By the time the Quinjet had touched down in San Francisco, it was around late afternoon. The sun was just starting to lower in the sky, masking the streets in amber. It was a shame that they didn't have the time to admire the city truly. Maybe another day.

The directions given by a reluctant Hank Pym had sent them straight to the front door of Scott Lang's apartment. It was a small, reasonably old building, not exactly the zenith of luxury, but considering Lang's background as a working man, it made all too much sense.

The group arrived at the entrance to flat 47, Sam shuffling past the door to wait opposite Bucky and Wanda, the latter holding on to his remaining arm, as support most likely. Supporting whom, Sam couldn't quite figure out. Bucky had been getting into the habit of living without the arm, mostly to help his posture, but mainly to further separate himself from his life as the Winter Soldier. Wanda was happy to help him since he had developed a slight lean on his left side to compensate for the weight of his metal arm. She acted both as a buffer and as a guide for him so that he wouldn't accidentally lean into the road or bump into anyone on the sidewalk. It was sweet. Bucky seemed to be enjoying it immensely.

Sam gave the door a strong thrice of knocks, before standing back. A shallow thud of footsteps made their way closer to the door.

"Just coming!" The sound of a tired, male voice, presumably Lang, called from inside. The door slowly swung open, revealing his drooping face.

"Hey, what-" It took a moment for him to register the faces in front of him. His dozy disposition was shattered. His frame physically jumped. His eyes grew to the size of saucers, and his mouth fell open. "Jesus! Oh, I'm sorry, just wait a second."

He slammed the door, and hurried padding of feet on wood signalled his retreat into the depths of the apartment.

"Hope," his voice hissed, "Help me a get a shirt on."

"Get your own damn shirt," a female voice replied lazily.

"It's the Avengers!"

The woman audibly scoffed.

"Nice try, Scott."

"No, I'm serious, it's the Avengers."

"Riiiiight…"

"Hope, I'm not kidding around. The Falcon, Bucky Barnes, the Scarlet Witch-"

"What, you mean-?"

"They're right outside the door!"

"Wait, they're here?! Now?!"

"Yes!"

A new set of thuds and scuffles signalled that the woman inside was now moving around just as frantically as he was.

"Where's my shirt?"

"I don't know-"

"Scott, where's my shirt?!"

"Somewhere - I don't know where I threw it!"

"I'm gonna borrow one of your shirts."

"What?"

"The Avengers are at the door, I need a shirt!"

"I need a shirt!"

"Just pick one up off the floor!"

"I'm not wearing a dirty shirt to meet the Avengers."

"They know who you are, I doubt they could think any less of you."

"First of all, ow. Second of all… okay, yeah. But most of all I wanna look at least somewhat presentable. This could be a crisis!"

"This is a crisis! I can't find a shirt!"

"What's wrong with my shirts?"

"They're all awful."

"This is awkward," Sam whispered under his breath to no one in particular. The other two occupants of the hallway glanced at him in a way that silently voiced their agreement.

"They all look exactly the same," Scott's voice continued.

"That's the problem," the woman's voice seethed back.

"You have, like, five jackets that look the same."

As the hushed arguing continued, it was all that the new Avengers could but stand around and occupy themselves. Bucky had conveniently discovered a new-found interest in the ceiling, and Wanda had decided to spend her time debating the font of the numbers on Scott's door.

"I only have four jackets in total, Scott."

"That's still too many jackets!"

"Yeah, well, it's better than none."

"Do you think they can hear us?" Scott asked. The movement from inside stopped suddenly.

"I don't know, Sam," Bucky asked loudly, "do you think we can hear them?"

There was a moment of silence before a quiet expletive was heard from beyond, and the scuffling began again in earnest. Bucky allowed himself the tiniest of smirks, which earned him a poke in the ribs from (presumably Wanda's) elbow.

"Ow," he protested. He turned to see the young woman at his side, sending him a disapproving glance.

"James," she scolded.

"He's right," Bucky excused, nodding to Sam. "It was awkward."

"It's still awkward," Sam replied.

"Are we sure it's not too late to head to Norway?" Bucky offered tiredly.

"At least give him a chance," Sam refuted. "He did kinda save the universe, after all."

"Aww, thanks man," the voice of Scott chirped from inside. It was visible in Sam's face that his resolve was waning.

"You're not helping this, tic-tac."

"'Tic-tac'?" Wanda asked.

"'Tic-tac'. 'Cause he's small," Sam gestured with his fingers. "And, you know… white."

It was clear from the somewhat unresponsive faces of his teammates that they held his inside joke in far less regard than he did.

"Is that it?" Bucky asked. Sam crossed his arms irritably.

"It's better than 'Ant-Man'," he grumbled.

The sound of the door unlocking came mercifully and swiftly, and the door opened, revealing both Scott and another woman with long black hair. Both of them were fully dressed.

"Hey, sorry to keep you waiting," Scott greeted them, pulling the door inwards. "Come in."

"Hi," the ebony-haired woman said. "I'm Hope. It's nice to meet you."

"Pleasure to meet you - your Hank's daughter, right?" Sam asked. Hope nodded. "I'm Sam. This is Wanda and Bucky. You guys know Scott, obviously, but you are…?"

"He's my boyfriend," she explained.

"I'm the boyfriend," he grinned. She side-eyed him pointedly.

"Yeah, I just said that."

"Sorry, I'm just very proud," Scott beamed.

"Aww," Wanda cooed. Bucky could swear that her grip on his arm had tightened slightly.

"How long has this been going on?" he asked, diverting his attention back to the couple in front of him.

"A few months," Hope offered.

"Well, officially a few months," Scott blustered. "We've been sort of doing the whole dance around for a few years now. You know the whole… thing…"

"A few months," Hope said conclusively, to Scott's chagrin.

"Can I get you guys some tea?" he offered quickly.

"Actually, we're just here for a quick talk," Sam replied, waving his hand in a polite dismissal. "Can we sit?"

"Oh, yeah, sure. Go ahead."

He gestured to their right, where a couple of sofas were planted around a coffee table. Sam took a seat on the farthest side of the long couch, followed by Wanda and Bucky. Scott and Hope seated themselves opposite.

"What do you want to talk about?" Hope opened. Sam sent a look to the pair at his side, preparing to deliver the all-important question

"We wanna formally offer you both a place on the team."

The couple blinked.

"Wha- On the Avengers team?" Scott gasped. Sam nodded.

"After all your help against Thanos, we thought it was only fair that both of you were each offered a position as an Avenger."

The two were staggered, to say the least. Hope had adopted a thousand-yard stare, and Scott had suddenly lost the ability of speech, his mouth perpetually open in an 'o'.

"Now," Sam quickly added, "I know currently living and working out of San Francisco means that this would be a big commitment."

"Wow," Scott exhaled after a long pause of silence. "I… I mean this is… quite the shock. We did not expect this at all."

"Not even after everything you've done for the world?" Wanda asked, her brow furrowing.

"Well, no one really cares about Ant-Man, surely?" Scott explained with a hint of resignation.

"You'd be surprised…" Bucky offered. "I was a war criminal for the longest time. I'm not exactly anyone's hero."

The soft glance from the woman by his went below his notice, but Sam caught it, in its fleeting presence. As quickly as it was there, it was gone, trained back into a neutral smile.

"Yeah, well, fighting with Captain America and all certainly helps, Scott began to protest modestly.

"Hey, you were at Germany that day, just like us," Wanda countered. "You're just as much part of Team Cap as we are."

Scott sent a pointed look to Hope.

"See, I told you we call him 'Cap'."

"Yeah, I know," she replied, suppressing a smile. She returned her gaze to the three across from her. "We're honoured, really, but this is… a lot."

"We understand," Sam offered, holding his palm out in placating gesture.

"It's just… I've got my mom and dad, and Scott's got his daughter. This would change everything…"

"It would. To be fair, we're not asking for a full-time position. We just need to know," Sam explained, pulling out the soul-piercing stare he had been practising since the day he had received the shield, "that when the time comes when we need you both, can we count on you to be there."

They never stood a chance. Even his teammates seemed surprised, taken aback at his sudden shift in demeanour. Scott positively looked giddy.

"You absolutely can, Captain America, sir," he said in his wanderlust, providing a solid salute along with it. It was a nice touch.

Hope took one look at her boyfriend, realising that now, there was no stopping him.

"I guess we're Avengers now."


	4. Chapter 4

__A bolt of lightning. Clothed in moonlight, painting the land silver. Dust, reconstructing, familiarising, trapped. The face of Pietro, consumed in darkness, screaming, flailing, surrounded on all sides, trying to escape. The soul of her brother trapped in a space below, between life and death, fighting to get out. He calls to her, begging, cursing, crying. His white face fades away, morphed into green and red and yellow, the face of her boyfriend splintering into shards, then reversed, put back together. A giant hand plucks his brain from his head, and the colour drains from his skin. She was crouched over his dead body, as she felt herself fade away, giving in. Her vision turned red and voice surrounded her.__

_"___Save me…"__

_"___Steve…"__

_"___Why don't you love me…"__

_"___Why have you forsaken me…"__

_"___So quick to forget…"  
___"___You can tear them apart…"__

_"___I love you…"__

_"___From the inside…"__

Wanda jerked awake, shivering violently. A bead of sweat running down her forehead as she scans her environment. Her cabin in the Quinjet, the moon illuminating the cloud layer below them just outside the window. Sam is vigilant on the bridge, piloting the jet, whispering to the holographic display of Rhodey's face. Pietro is nowhere to be seen. She's safe.

She melted back into her sheets, her arm coming up to rest in front of her eyes. Her hand squeezed around Bucky Bear, and a flood of relief filled her body. It was just a dream. It was just a dream. A recurring, awful, paralysing dream. Ever since that awful day, ever since they had been brought back, the nightmares had begun plaguing her nights. It was always the same images of Vision, Pietro, maybe even Ultron if she were so lucky. Every night. It was beginning to make her dread sleep. It made her feel so childish, sitting there in her bunk, being anxious to fall asleep, in case the nightmares came back to scare her. She sighed, partly out of weariness, partly out of irritation, partly just to try and expel the overwhelming dread that had sunk in during the night.

"Hey."

She lifted her arm to see her fellow Avenger kneeling beside her bunk, his natural arm leaning against the mattress, his brow furrowed in concern.

"James," she whispered. She couldn't help the smile that soon found its way onto her lips.

"You feeling okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, yeah. What time is it?"

He glanced at the watch on his wrist.

"It's comin' up half past twelve."

"Did I wake you up?" Wanda asked. He shook his gently, sending her a reassuring smile.  
"No, I've been up for a while," he told her. "I just came to check on you. You were tossing pretty violently."

She frowned, turning so that she was staring back up at the ceiling.

"I had this awful dream," she groaned. "It's just that, though: a dream, nothing more. I - of all people - would know the difference."

"You wanna talk about it?" he offered. She turned back to look him in the face.

"I'm not even sure I can remember it," she lied.

He nodded, turning away for a moment, and a spike of fresh terror gripped her system. Her hand shot out and grabbed his wrist.

"Can you stay?" she asked hurriedly. He turned back towards her, looking her in the eye. She bit her bottom lip. "I… don't want to be alone."

"Of course," he said. He gripped her hand as he turned away t pullup a box to sit, giving him better support to lean closer to her. He glanced down, noticing the stuffed bear by her side, and smirked. "Although, technically, you're not alone."

She followed his line of sight to Bucky Bear and flushed.

"He's soft. Helps me sleep."

"As long as you're getting some use out of him," he shrugged.

"Sorry, I know you hate him, but he is very sweet," she said, lifting the bear waving its arms around.

"I guess. I'm just not sure about the outfit."

"I like it," she admitted. "Besides, they had to find some way to make sure you didn't get too overshadowed by Captain Spangles."

He grinned.

"'Captain Spangles'?" he chuckled.

"Uh huh," she grinned back. "I used to call him that as an insult when I was a teenager. I thought it was edgy."

"It's a shame I didn't come up with that sooner, the boys would have had a field day with that. Although, Steve never really wore anything that colourful back in the day."

"Did you?" she asked, lifting the bear into his field of vision accusingly. "Or is this a bear of lies?"

"I've never worn anything like that," he laughed softly. "The jacket is close, I did wear a blue jacket. I've no idea where the rest of it came from."

"Probably to help sell toys. And it worked, obviously," she shrugged, tucking the bear back into her sheets. "It's a shame that James Barnes isn't as popular as Steve Rogers. Sorry, you prefer 'Bucky' don't you?"

"No, no, James is fine," he replied, shaking his head. "I like James."

"You don't mind?" she asked, tilting her head to the side. "I thought maybe 'Bucky' was a bit too personal…"

"No, not at all. It's 'James' that's personal." His eyes fell to the floor, his fragile smile falling into a frown. His mind sang a chord of melancholy. "My mom used to call me that. I don't think anyone has since."

"I like calling you James," she said softly. He looked up, rebuilding his reassuring mask.

"Only from you," he promised. He nodded to the man in the cockpit. "Sam doesn't get that privilege."

"So I'm one of the privileged few," she teased, daring to lean closer. "I'm honoured."

"You're my teammate, after all," he explained. "We fight together."

The two remained like that for a moment, smiling warmly, enjoying one another's company.

"I don't really have a nickname," she pondered. "It's just 'Wanda'. For Vision, I remember I used to call him 'Vis'…"

Despite her best efforts, she could feel her spirits quickly diminishing. Rather than pull her out of her reminiscence, James surprisingly indulged in it.

"Did he mind?" he prompted.

"No," she whispered. Nostalgic memories of her and Vision spending intimate evening together came to the forefront of her mind. "I don't think so. I thought he would say something if he did."

"Sometimes it's hard to turn down something from the person you love, even a name."

She studied him, weighing his words against his aura.

"Do you have experience with that, James?" she asked, in an off-handed manner, merely to keep the conversation going. She didn't expect the maelstrom of different emotions that rolled off of his mind, like a fog. Too many to comprehend, too many to process any particular one.

"Just a bit," he replied. It wasn't an answer, but it read like a confession.

"Do you mind 'Bucky'?" she asked, shirting the limelight away from her. He shuffled slightly, adjusting himself.

"I'd take Bucky over what I used to be called."

"The Winter Soldier?"

"No," he all but growled, his hand tightening around her's. His anger wasn't towards her, she knew that, but it didn't stop her from shrinking away. He quickly noticed her anxiety, loosening his grip, rubbing a calloused thumb along her knuckled as if to apologise. "That was what the survivors called me. My handlers had a special name for me when I was on duty. They called me Красная Рука, literally 'the Red Hand'. It meant the Hand of Russia; then, later, it morphed into the hand of HYDRA."

"The Red Hand, and the Scarlet Witch," she noted. "HYDRA's secret weapons. Or as I like to call us, HYDRA's greatest mistakes."

"Hmm, aye to that," he nodded. "They certainly regret us now, don't they?"

"They'd better," she said with a wicked smirk. His eyes darkened, but not with anything like sadness or anger. It was more like… ambition? Desire? Satisfaction? Was he satisfied with how they had dealt with HYDRA? With how they ruthlessly hunted down and eradicated each of the HYDRA cells across the globe, during those two rugged, reckless years together on the run? Was it anything similar to his missions with Steve, before there even was a Winter Soldier? Suddenly, another trail of thought popped into her brain. "Do you ever miss it, the wartime?"

"Not the war, no," he reminisced. "The happy memories. Working with Steve, fighting across Europe. It was war, but I had my best friend with me, for a time. I don't think about it too often. I want to make good memories now. I don't want to think my best years are behind me."

"That can happen at one hundred years old," she grinned.

"I think I'm a little past a mid-life crisis by now, Wanda," he chuckled.

"I meant do you miss before the war?" she clarified.

"I miss my mom," he said honestly. "I miss helping Steve - nowadays he's the one helping me. I had a few friends, but I find myself struggling to remember it all. HYDRA took a lot more from me than time."

"I sense it." He sent her a strange look. She shook her head. "I didn't mean to look, I didn't, but sometimes it's so loud and I can't help but hear. I could help you, maybe? To unlock those memories again? I couldn't imagine what it would be like if I couldn't remember my family… Pietro… Vis…"

"I couldn't ask that of you," he said wearily.

"You could," she insisted, grabbing his hand even tighter. "I want to help. Not just to go against HYDRA, but to help my teammate. You shouldn't be what they made you. You should be Bucky."

He smiled for her, matching her grip.

"I'm more than that, Wanda. I used to be the Red Hand, to others the Winter Soldier. Now, I am Bucky, but I'm also the White Wolf. And, to a special few… I'm James."

"Then let me help you, James," she all but pleaded.

"Let me help you first, Wanda," he replied. She paused.

"Me?" she asked. "I don't need help."

"That's what we all think," he said cryptically. He glanced at the watch on his wrist. "It's late. You should get back to sleep, we have a long flight to Norway."

She nodded. She reluctantly released his hand from her grasp, immediately feeling smaller. He was about to stand when she called for him.

"James." He paused, his eyes finding hers once again. "When we get to Wakanda… can I see where you lived, just like you said?"

He seemed genuinely surprised as if he had expected her to forget he even offered. How could she forget? Why would she forget such an honest act of kindness?

"Of course," he nodded. He reached over and patted the head of Bucky Bear. "You keep her safe, alright bud?"

She playfully lifted its paw in an imitation of a salute.

"'Yes, sir!'" she said in a high pitched voice that she thought appropriate for the little bear.

His smile reached all the way to his eyes, as he turned to walk towards the cockpit of the jet, leaving her alone with her stuffed toy as her companion. As she clutched the fluffy version of her teammate to her chest, Wanda knew deep down that tonight she would sleep better, if not well.

"Eyes front, Captain."

The sound of Bucky Barnes broke Sam from his recollection of the previous 24 hours. He shuffled in the pilot's seat, rotating it on its mechanism it to better address him

"Don't you start with that, too," he warned.

"What's got you distracted?" Bucky asked, prompting Sam to sigh and slump in his seat.

"Even with Scott and Hope on-side, we've still only four active members," he explained, shaking his head. "It's not enough. I guess I just thought this trip would go much better than it has."

"You know, I thought Strange was being an ass, too," Bucky assured, trusting his intuition. Sam waved it off.

"Doesn't matter. Plenty of assholes in the world, Barnes. If I'm gonna lead this team I'm gonna have to get used to them, like he said."

Bucky could respect that. Even he had doubts that Sam was ready for the role of Captain, but he was taking to it with a near boundless enthusiasm. He clapped Sam on the shoulder.

"Just remember you have friends too, huh?" he smiled, slapping him once more before standing back.

"You're my friend now?" Sam scoffed, stopping Bucky before he could walk any further. The centenarian paused, contemplating, before nodding.

"I hope so," he smirked. "Otherwise this trip is gonna feel a lot longer."

He turned, seemingly satisfied, turning to walk back to his bunk.

"Buck," Sam called after him. The man stopped, glancing back him. "I'd say we're friends."

There was a strange look in Bucky's eye, quickly masked. He hung his head solemnly.

"Damn…" he sighed morosely.

"What?" Sam asked.

"I just wish I had a camera on me," Bucky replied cheekily, framing the scene between his fingers. "That was perfect. Moonlight and everything."

"You wouldn't even know how to work it, old man," Sam teased back. "By the way, if you want your slippers I packed them in your bag for you."

"Do you wanna be quiet," Bucky warned in a hushed voice. "Wanda's trying to sleep."

"Oh, but that didn't stop you, did it?" Sam noted slyly.

"Oh, shut up," Bucky blustered, his composure slipping.

"'The White Wolf'," Sam announced smoothly, nodded approvingly.

"Sam-"

He was interrupted by Sam doing his best impression of a wolf's howl, slightly tempered by laughter.

"That's it, you're no longer my friend," Bucky grumbled.

"Nah, no take-backsies," Sam called after him. "We're friends now!"

"I'm going to bed."

"Beeeeest-frieeeends," he chirped.

"I could choke you without the arm, Wilson."

"Oh, I guess I'll just have hide behind my shield, you know, cause I'm the captain."

"You know I've held that shield before," Bucky tried to sound nonchalant, but he ended up sounding more irritated. "Not that special, honestly."

"Sorry, what was that? I can't hear over the flap of my highly advanced titanium wings."

"You know we call you the Pigeon behind your back."

"Yeah, well we call you-"

"Boys!" the sound of Wanda's tried voice interrupted their verbal sparring. "Stop yapping, I'm trying to sleep."

"Sorry, Wanda," Bucky called back softly.

_"___Sorry, Wanda," __Sam called in a scathing imitation of Bucky's call.

"Goodnight to everyone except Sam," Bucky said pointedly, glaring that the man in question.

"Wanda, he's saying mean things to me," Sam whined melodramatically.

"James, don't say mean things," Wanda chastised, half awake.

"He started it," Bucky tried to deflect.

"Then be the bigger man and end it. I want to sleep," Wanda groaned.

Bucky fell silent, deciding to in fact be the bigger man. He looked back at Sam, was currently acting out a whipping motion with his hand, accompanied by a wide-eyed, exaggerated mime of 'Ouch'.

It took all the restraint and patience Bucky could muster to not throw a box at him.


	5. Chapter 5

The Quinjet touched down in a field near New Asgard just as the sun rose, reflecting magically upon the still waters of the surrounding sea. As it turned out, the new home of the Asgardians was a relatively quiet fishing village, sitting in a small cove surrounded by cliffs, looking out over the open sea leading off to the horizon. A couple of fishing boats could be seen moving across the waves, trawling in and out of the harbour. Nothing in the village suggested that it had any connection to the mythical Asgard, except for a newly built town hall, composed with elegant architecture that juxtaposed the rustic coastal houses that stood beside it.

The person they were looking for, Brunnhilde, also known as the last Valkyrie and queen of New Asgard, was nowhere to be found. The town hall and the pub were empty, probably due to it being relatively early in the morning. It was only after asking around when they were directed towards a lone hut on the hillside — Thor's hut.

Sam had been told by Banner the state that he and Rocket had found the god of thunder. Suffice to say it wasn't good. He had been spending his days drinking, eating and playing video games with two housemates. To Sam, that sounded more like more a college student than a king. Maybe that's why he had reportedly given up his title. Maybe he was taking a year off like a real college student would; gone with some friends for a bit of soul searching.

He could joke all he wanted, but the truth was that Thor was hit hard by the snap. Everyone was. Steve, Nat, Bruce, Clint; they had to live with the pain of that failure for five years. For Sam, it had only been a few seconds between him disappearing and suddenly waking up in the midst of the Wakandan jungle. Five years could break even the best of them, Sam knew that. Even so, hearing the mighty Thor brought so low was hard to hear. They could only hope for the best.

When they finally reached the hut, Korg, the resident Kronan, and his friend Miek had told them that she had gone to the sea wall to think. Sam had decided previously that for this, he would tackle it alone, so with a gentle dismissal, he sent the pair off to explore the rest of the town, whilst he searched around for Brunnhilde. Eventually, he found he found her standing on the edge of the harbour, staring out over the coastline. It was convenient, but it was certainly dramatic. Perhaps that was what she was going for.

"Brunnhilde?" he called, announcing his presence. "Or do you prefer 'Valkyrie'?"

The lone Asgardian woman turned, giving him a once-over before returning her stare to the sea, unamused.

"I might be," she replied coolly. "You are?"

"Sam Wilson."

Her apathy transformed into curiosity before his very eyes.

"So, you're the new Captain America," she smirked.

"I am."

She whistled.

"That's a big role to fill," she poked.

"Speaking of which, I've heard you're royalty now," he poked right back.

"Acting monarch," she stubbornly clarified. "There's a difference. I'm technically queen, anointed by the true bloodline."

"That sounds like a queen to me."

She raised her eyebrows nonchalantly.

"Any reason for visiting?" she asked.

"Actually, yes. I've come to offer you a job."

She scoffed.

"A job?"

Sam nodded.

"As an Avenger."

Her casually swaying, fiddling with her arms and hands came to an abrupt halt. Her face, a picture of scepticism, began to slowly morph into a blank expression. It reminded Sam of a computer rebooting itself after a crash.

"Huh," was the sound she emitted after several moments of quiet. She fumbled her next words. "Those are 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes' right?"

"They are," Sam replied, careful to keep his tone even.

The corners of her lips turned upwards into an ironic smile.

"Scraping the bottom of the barrel, are you?" She asked rhetorically.

"Actually, you were on the shortlist," Sam clarified.

"I shouldn't be," she shook her head tiredly. "You don't want me around people. I'm not good with that. Thor's proof enough."

"What's Thor got to do with this?" Sam asked. "I mean, sure, he's at his best at the moment but-"

"And I'm the one who made him that way," she interrupted. Sam looked at her, confused. She continued regardless. "I was the one who suggested drinking. It's how I coped after I ran away from Asgard. I thought, yeah, why not let someone else make exactly the same mistakes as I did? After all he did for me, and when it's my turn to help him… I'm glad he's gone. Gone to the other side of the universe, far away from me."

"What about you?" Sam said. "You just gonna stay here, sit on your ass for the rest of your life feeling sorry for yourself?"

She sighed and her face hardened, looking back out over the water.

"These people need their queen."

"__Most __of the time." She fixed him with a disapproving glare. "Not to insult your power, but this ain't that much of a kingdom. It practically runs itself. I'm sure they can handle their queen not being there 24/7."

"What, you want me to leave Korg in charge?" she cringed.

"Not exactly, but surely you can spare a few days a week."

"A week?" she all but exclaimed. "Oh, yeah, __sure__."

"Being an Avenger is a commitment."

"So is being a queen."

"Look," Sam challenged, "travelling back and forth between here and New York isn't a problem for an Asgardian."

"No problem at all," she said incredulously, "it's only three and a half thousand miles. No big deal."

"For a spaceship, I'm sure it isn't."

"What makes you think we have spaceships?" she retorted. The sound of an approaching aircraft interrupted their argument, as a large, red and yellow, disk-shaped ship soared around the corner of the bay, landing precariously on the outskirts of the town. Sam glanced back to her, trying not to look smug. Brunnhilde had suddenly adopted a deer-in-the-headlights look about her as she shifted awkwardly. "Okay, that was bad timing. It's still too often for me to be away."

"I'm starting to think this is about more than just scheduling issues," Sam noted through narrowed eyes.

She didn't reply immediately, taking a moment to instead contemplate her next few words. Sam took that as a sign that he was getting through to her.

"Why me?" she finally asked. "Of all the people in the world, why come to me? I'm not an Avenger. I'm barely a Valkyrie."

"You came when it mattered," he pointed out.

"That was for the universe," she shrugged. "I couldn't really not, could I?"

"You could," he affirmed. "And yet, you didn't."

She sighed, looking anywhere else but him.

"How about that," she said distantly.

Sam risked placing a hand on her shoulder, keeping it there when she didn't react.

"Think about it," he said. "Just think about it for now. And if you ever get restless you know who to call."

With a final pat on the shoulder, he swivelled, aiming to walk away, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

"Wilson." Brunnhilde's call halted his stride. He turned back, to find her gazing back at him. "You lot got anywhere to be?"

"Wakanda," he answered, "by sundown."

"Shame," she replied. "I would've offered you all a place for the night. Thanks for coming by."

"You're welcome, your Majesty."

"So long, __Captain__."

Sam let out a laugh.

"Touche."

* * *

The game currently playing in front of the people sitting in Thor's hermit hut was a bewildering one, especially for Bucky, whose sole experience with technology over the past 70 years had been aggressively monitored by his handlers. It was something about parachuting with an umbrella on an island and a storm - the details were lost on him. It would have been the most bewildering thing in the room, had it not been played by an alien entirely made of stone.

Bucky had met some colourful characters in his travels, no doubting that. There was guy who climbed up walls, a man who shrank and grew at will - Bucky was particularly partial to a woman who could move things with her mind and whose hands glowed red. Even he wasn't exactly normal, owning and using a Vibranium arm and being a member of the Avengers.

But a living rock. Who talked. With a New Zealand accent. That was certainly a cut above normal.

Bucky's mother had taught him to mind his own business when he was child, which was an easy thing to adhere to during the Depression, but when you have a being whose very nature defied everything you ever thought about life in the universe, questions were inevitably going to arise. And so they did.

"So you're a rock person?" Bucky tried to deliver it as casually as he could, considering the circumstance. God, he wished Wanda was here - she would have no problem asking all the right questions. Plus she looked so innocent and caring, and she had eyes that could make you spill your darkest secrets... That girl could get away with murder.

"Technically the name for it is a Kronan," Korg explained past the microphone, "but my ma always said I was made of trouble."

The joke stewed in silence before Korg chuckled, nudging him gently.

"That was a joke," he smiled awkwardly. "She actually said I was made of disappointment, and that I lacked a spine, which is true since Kronans don't have spines, though I don't she was referring to that precisely."

"You have a mom?" Bucky asked.

"Yeah. My mum was a cliff. My dad was a boulder, though he hasn't been around since I was young."

Bucky chose to appear assuring for the giant rock man.

"I'm so sorry."

"Nah, don't bother," Korg waved it off. "It was my dad's fault."

"Really? What did he do?"

"No, he had a fault," Korn emphasised. "Split him in half, right down the middle. Just-" He exploding his fingers with a 'poof', "-gone. Nothing we could do."

"… Right…"

He pondered for a moment, trying to rationalise the lunacy he had just heard. Were all aliens like this? Probably not because Thor was apparently an alien he looked normal. Did they also…?

"Sorry, this is gonna sound a bit personal but your people, how do you…?"

Korn looked at him with raised eyebrows as Bucky demonstrated with a casual wave of his hand.

"Same as you, I should think."

Bucky's eyebrows shot up.

"Oh really?"

"Yeah, I mean the guys have stones, the women have cracks, and then the two, you know," Korg nodded suggestively, "get things rolling."

"Huh…" Bucky replied with an almost scientific curiosity.

"Yep," Korg slid his hand in a downwards arch past his leg. "Just right down the hill."

"Right down the-" Bucky paused as the last few words caught up to him. "What?"

"You know, hill," Korg repeated as if it were obvious. "Rolling stones and all that."

"Ro-rolling stones?"

"Yeah."

The Kronan turned back towards the screen, where his game continued to play on. Bucky, still feeling completely lost, simply sat and watched.

"… I'm confused," he admitted eventually.

"It's simple, man," Korg said, pausing the game and putting the controller aside. "You know how you humans make love to rolling stones?"

Bucky's eyes widened.

"What? Who…?"

"I heard someone say so down the pub, about how he and his partner made love to rolling stones once."

The dots connected in Bucky's mind.

"'The Rolling Stones'?"

"Right, rolling stones," Korg caught parroted slowly, presumably (in his mind) for Bucky's benefit. "Same for us. When two Kronans love each other very much - or forget protection when it comes to my parents-"

"James?" The sound of the hut door opening and the pristine voice of Wanda interrupted the Kronan.

"Oh, thank god," Bucky whispered under his breath, rocketing to his feet to greet her loudly before Korg could continue. "Wanda! Hi, hello! How are you?"

"I'm fine, thank you," she replied. "Sam's just done talking with Valkyrie-"

"And it's time for us to go," Bucky finished her sentence. He grabbed her arm, glancing back to rock alien seated on the couch. "I'm so sorry, Korn-"

"Korg."

"Korg, yes," he corrected himself, "we have to get rolling otherwise we'll never make to Africa in time."

Korg seemed like he was about to protest, but then a certain flash of recognition spread throughout his face. He nodded slowly.

"Right," he said slowly. "__Rolling__. Gotcha."

He seemed genuinely pleased with himself.

"No- Yes-" Bucky stumbled. He tried to Wanda pleadingly. "Can we go, please?"

"James, are you alright?"

"Yeah, just anxious to get going," he smiled in a way that he hoped was convincing.

"Yep. Betcha ya can't wait to get all that __rolling __done," Korg sounded from behind him.

"We're leaving," Bucky said definitively, pulling Wanda out the door.

"Go get 'em, pal," the voice of Korg followed them from inside. "Don't forget to use prote-"

The slam of the wooden door cut him off before he could finish, leaving Bucky and Wanda arm in arm outside the hut.

"What was he talking about?" Wanda asked as they made their back toward the Quinjet a few minutes later.

"Something about the Rolling Stones," he replied casually.

"Really?" Wanda perked up. "I love the Rolling Stones."

The centenarian sighed as he boarded the plane with his secret crush, cursing the irony of it all.

"Of course you do."


	6. Chapter 6

"This is Quinjet AV6169. This is Captain Sam Wilson requesting access to Wakandan airspace. Over."

The radio remained silent. Sam repeated his message once again. This time, a garbled sound of a reply emitted from the overhead speakers. It was a neutral, almost robotic sounding voice, with the tiniest hint of a Ugandan accent.

"This is Wakandan air control, to Quinjet AV6169, please state the nature of your transmission. Over."

"Requesting access to Wakandan airspace. We are expected by his royal majesty King T'Challa. We are here on official Avengers business. Over," he added, trying to lend as much authenticity as he could. He didn't need to, of course - they were expected after all - but it certainly couldn't hurt.

The radio fell into silence yet again. A few seconds passed. A few more. No reply. Sam stiffened in his seat.

"Your claim has been verified. Granting access to Wakandan airspace. Please follow the exact coordinates now being transmitted to your aircraft." As promised, the screen in front of him lit up with a sequence of vector codes. "You will be guided to a safe landing zone once you have passed the border control."

"Thank you."

He shut off the radio, refocusing his attention to the flight controls. He manoeuvred the jet per the coordinates he had just been sent. They pointed him towards the side of a large mountain, topped with vegetation. A small voice in Sam's head instinctively told him to pull away from what in another scenario would be imminent death, but he squashed it for now. He had done this all before. He knew what lay on the other side of that mountain. Not that it really was a mountain, he reminded himself as the Quinjet flew closer and closer and closer to the wall of rock that lay ahead.

Just as the front of the craft was bound to hit the broad side of the cliff, it didn't. The holographic facade passed by them, the and the Quinjet emerged into the evening shadow of a high valley, wherein lay the sprawling capital city of Wakanda.

"Message to Quinjet AV6169," the radio continued, this time in perfect clarity. "Welcome, Captain Wilson."

A couple of smaller ships flanked his sides, pulling ahead of him, their tales adorned with red beacons.

"Please follow the guide ships. They will escort you to your landing bay. Over."

"Over and Out."

True to their word, the accompanying crafts lead him to a small strip of landing space, a large building sat on the opposite end. Sam lined up the jet, cooling down the engines, putting them in a slow glide that allowed them a smooth landing. It was as the plane was taxiing across the last half mile of the runway that Sam was able to see a large crowd of people standing on the tarmac, bordered by the Wakandan royal guard. It looked like half the country had turned up. For the sake of his nerves, Sam refused to believe it could be because of them.

Eventually, the Quinjet came a halt. The hanger door lowered, allowing the trio to stride out into the evening sunlight. T'Challa, flanked by Okoye and the Dora Milaje, was stood in front of them, smiling. The three Avengers greeted him accordingly.

"Your Majesty."

T'Challa shook his head, holding his hands up to halt them.

"Enough with that," he commanded gently. "I like to think we are above pleasantries. It is good to see you are well."

"Likewise," Sam greeted, shaking his hand. T'Challa turned to Bucky next.

"Sergeant Barnes," he said, as they too shook hands. "How are you?"

"Better," he replied. "Not perfect... but better."

T'Challa nodded dutifully. He then turned to Wanda, taking her hand softly.

"Miss Maximoff."

"Wanda, please."

"Wanda," he corrected himself. His free hand came to rest against hers in a reassuring gesture. "I am sorry that we couldn't save Vision in time. He was a good man until the end."

The warm smile that Wanda had cultivated fell. Her eyes began to shine, looking down at her feet before it became apparent.

"You did the best you could."

The clap of Sam's hands drew T'Challa's attention away from Wanda.

"So," he announced, rubbing his hands casually, "How's the country?"

T'Challa took the hint, leaving Wanda be.

"Surprisingly not in ruins," he smiled. "M'Baku served my people well in my absence."

"That's good news." Sam swivelled don the spot, taking in the massive crowd of people surrounding the landing strip. "There is certainly a lot of them."

"Word of your arrival spread quickly," T'Challa shrugged with barely-hidden amusement. "Suffice to say they were more than a little excited to see the Avengers."

"Well, not to disappoint but it's just us, I'm afraid."

"Nonsense, you are plenty," he laughed, clapping his hand on Sam's shoulder. "Follow me, we will continue this conversation on our way to the palace."

The trio was lead through the parted masses, through what was presumably some sort of embassy and into a Wakandan limousine. The inside of the vehicle mirrored the same black and traditional purple pattern that was indicative of the royal family, containing many luxuries that outclassed a private jet. It wasn't spacious - a limousine by nature couldn't be - but it was certainly comfortable. It was a nice change of pace after hours of sitting on a metal pilot's chair.

Sam took a moment to gaze out of the window as the car cruised past street after street. The city was filled to the brim with culture, colour and people. It was a thriving metropolis, not unlike New York or London, but the African architecture woven throughout the city made every building look unique.

"I almost expected this place to be a bit more run down, after losing half of its population," Sam noted from his seat opposite T'Challa's. Wanda and Bucky were squashed together on his side, as they had been since leaving the airstrip. T'Challa stared out of his accompanying window and smiled.

"Some selfish part of me expected that too," he admitted. "It is very humbling to know that your country can manage without you."

"Manage, your majesty, not flourish," Okoye added from T'Challa's right.

"There is no need to flatter, Okoye," he grinned. "I am glad to see our nation stepping out into the world. We are finally experiencing tourism, from all over the globe."

"I'll apologise for the US in advance," Sam quipped.

T'Challa waved him off casually.

"There is no need, Captain. Our American visitors are more than welcome. Most of the time."

"Okay, if I can't call you Your Majesty you definitely can't call me Captain."

"Suit yourself," the King shrugged. "I understand the pressure of a country's expectations upon one's shoulders. As I hope to represent the best of what Wakanda can be, you stand as a testament to America, and what it can achieve."

"You sure you got the right guy?" Bucky quipped from the corner. T'Challa chuckled. Wanda simply shook her head, trying her best to disguise the little smile that crept onto her face.

"Before I forget, Barnes," T'Challa added, "Shuri wished for me to tell you that she wants you in for evaluation."

"I thought my therapy was over?" Bucky asked.

"For the most part," T'Challa explained, "it is, but as anyone who has met my sister can concur, she likes to be thorough."

The limousine stopped before the entrance to an impressive building, what Sam assumed could only be the royal palace. A line of guards flanked the vehicle, allowing them a safe exit, where they could glance around, getting a better look and the King's abode.

"Okoye," T'Challa called, "please tell the servants to prepare three bedchambers for our guests. Royal bedchambers, please."

"Oh, that won't be necessary," Sam tried to interject, but T'Challa would her none of it.

"Nonsense," he insisted. "It's the least I can do for the Avengers."

* * *

The throne room itself was equally as impressive. A glass floor revealing a cavern that was stretching down into the depths of the earth. An expansive area, bordered with gold and vibranium and stone, with a window on the far side looking down on the cityscape. At the centre sat the throne, situated upon a platform of rock embedded into the glass, so large that it followed the cavern down into the darkness. It was a feat in interior design. It made Sma feel like he was stepping on hallowed ground. His reluctance was contrasting by T'Challa's confident stride, and he sat upon his throne, resuming the posture of a noble leader.

"It's a shame that we won't be seeing Rogers again," he noted. "We had prepared a lovely villa near the southern lake. I'm sure he would have liked it."

"Trust me, T'Challa, you've done more than enough for him already," Sam replied. "He appreciated it all."

"I can only hope," he said earnestly. "In the meantime, the shield has fallen to you."

"It has indeed," Sam nodded.

"As has the title and all that comes with it."

"Well, I am in charge of the Avengers, now, so that's a thing."

"I don't envy that challenge," T'Challa smirked. "How many?"

"For now, it's only us," Bucky answered. "Steve is out, Romanoff is…" - He paused, searching for the right word - "out, Thor is off-world, Banner is recovering, you know what happened to Stark and Barton is officially retired. The Avengers, as it used to be, is no longer a thing."

The King frowned.

"That is concerning."

"It is," Sam agreed, "which is why we've been on a little road trip."

"Recruiting those that are left, I presume?"

"More like inviting them," Wanda explained. "We all have our own priorities, especially after everything this world has been through. Asking them to commit to something like the Avengers so soon after Thanos… it's unfeasible."

"But it's the only option we've got," Sam continued. "Thanos may be gone, but I'm willing to bet he's not the only one in the universe that poses a threat. We need the Avengers, and the Avengers need people."

"Then why come to me?" T'Challa asked.

"Because we think you could be one of those people."

The King sat up a little straighter, adjusting the ring on his finger.

"You want me to be an Avenger?"

"That's the gist of it."

"I see," he said. He stared at each of them as if evaluating them for some unknown test. "It doesn't need mentioning that my responsibilities as King will interfere with my responsibilities as an Avenger."

"We understand," Sam nodded.

"I hold your invitation in high regard," he added. "Truly, I consider it a great blessing. However, the day I became King, I swore an oath to my people that I would put them beyond anyone else."

"You can still do so. We're not asking you to leave your people, your majesty," Wanda assured him.

"T'Challa, please," he replied warmly.

"T'Challa," she repeated. "If a crisis were ever to happen again, we need to know if we can rely on you to be there with us. If another Thanos were ever to come around, we need to know who we have to counter it."

The King nodded, rising from his throne.

"Then you have my promise."

Sam reached out his hand, which the King took gladly, holding it firmly in his grasp.

"Welcome to the Avengers, King T'Challa."

"It is an honour, for me, for my people, for Wakanda itself. I will bear it like a medal," he beamed. After a moment of reverence, they finally broke their hold. T'Challa glanced around, seemingly in anticipation. "Is that all?"

"Pretty much, yeah," Sam shrugged.

"All this way for that?" T'Challa smirked. "This could not have been done over the phone? We do phones in Wakanda."

"We wanted to offer it to you personally," Bucky explained. "Consider it a token of good faith."

"Fair enough," T'Challa sighed. "Now, if that is all for the proceedings, it is getting late. If it is alright with you three, I will have dinner prepared."

"Will you be joining us?" Wanda asked.

"Of course," he smiled, escorting them out of the throne room. "I would like to get to know my fellow Avengers a bit more, after all."

* * *

A couple of hours later, after a hearty supper in the palace dining hall, Wand and Bucky had excused themselves, leaving Sam and TC'halla to further discuss the king's role in the new team. A couple of palace guards had escorted them through to an elevator that descended down into the caves below the capitol building, the glass tube allowing them a view of the caverns that lay just beneath the surface of the country. The Vibranium that weaved itself into the rock shone luminescent blue, making the tracks and buildings that lay within sparkle.

Eventually, the lift came to a halt, allowing them to depart. After a short walk past a few brightly decorated corridors, the two Avengers came to what looked like a lab, what with its white desks and shiny clean instruments. The main laboratory and the waiting area, a much comfier room populated with chairs, a sofa, a coffee table and a tasteful houseplant, were separated by a towering plane of glass embedded in the cave walls, a single automatic door being the only way in or out.

Sitting at the coffee table, reading from a tablet was a young Wakandan woman, whose eyes darted up from her reading. She stood to greet them, showing off the royal crest of her family subtly woven into her dress.

"Sergeant Barnes," the young woman greeted with a warm smile.

"Shuri," Bucky nodded back.

"I've heard rumours that T'Challa is an Avenger now."

"That he is."

She rolled her eyes.

"Honestly. You do know he will never shut up about that?"

"Hey, as long as he's helping us save the world, I don't mind."

"I do." She turned her attention towards Wanda. "And you must be Miss Maximoff."

"Wanda, please," she replied kindly.

"I'm Shuri, T'Challa's sister," she said, "His smarter, cooler sister, but he would never admit it."

Wanda giggled in response, causing a small smile to erupt on Bucky's face, a smile that Shuri silently noted.

"They are ready for you, Sergeant Barnes," she urged.

Bucky wiped the subtle grin from his lips, refocusing on the young scientist in front of him. His only response was a stiff nod. Wanda, noticing his discomfort, chimed in.

"Should I leave?" she asked him.

"No, no. You can stay if you want," Bucky insisted, his hand clasping her should gently. He gave Shuri a pointed look. "I trust her."

"With how much?" she asked sceptically. Bucky stared on, unyielding.

"Everything."

Shuri seemed taken aback for a moment, her eyes flitting back and forth between him and Wanda, before schooling herself.

"Very well."

"Thank you." He gave Wanda one last smile. "See you later?"

"Of course," she replied, matching his warmth. Reluctantly, let go of her shoulder, striding away oast the two of them into the lab, where a couple of doctors in white robes were waiting for him. Wanda glanced at Shuri again, studying her. "Are you the same Shuri who helped James get rid of HYDRA's programming?"

"I am indeed," she replied

"He's very grateful," Wanda assured her. "I have no idea how you did it."

"It's much simpler than one would believe," she explained. "We mostly start off with immunising the patient to their triggers. In his case, it was getting him used to hearing his trigger words in different contexts. We'd announce them to him at random times, always out of order, training him to assume breathing exercises when he hears them. The panic of hearing those triggers only made him more vulnerable to their programming, so removing that was our first step. It's during that time when we also took brain scans, studying which parts of the brain were most affected by their mental programming. From there it's transforming that programming into something mostly benign. And that's where we are now."

"You mean, it's not gone?" Wanda asked, her eyes widening. "It's still in there?"

The look that Shuri gave her in response spoke little reassurance.

"Now, speaking his trigger words in order only brings about a post-hypnotic state, wherein he is open to small, benign suggestions that he wouldn't be too opposed in doing otherwise - nothing to the extent of the Winter Soldier."

"That still isn't perfect."

"I am aware," she replied tersely, but not in any mean spirit. "Unfortunately, his programming isn't something we can merely turn off or cut out. It's deeply rooted in years of psychological trauma. Whoever was tasked in turning him into the Winter Soldier knew what they were doing."

"What did they do to him?" Wanda asked, not entirely sure that she wanted to know the answer. Shuri's eyes darkened, her mind clouded over into storm of anger.

"We believe that he was regularly tortured, in ways designed to disorientate him, to make him lose track of time, space, even his own identity."

Wanda felt her heart fall into her stomach. Despite herself, Wanda found her eyes drifting back to the image of Bucky, sitting in the lab. He was staring off into the middle distance, the way that usually did when he thought that he was alone. She began to notice the faint scarring around his left shoulder, her mind flooding with dread over how it got there.

"For how long?"

"We don't know," Shuri replied solemnly. "Considering that he went missing in action in 1945, and his first kill as the Winter Soldier occurred in the early 60s, we can only guess he was most extensively tortured in the 20 years between."

"20 years?" she whispered.

"It is horrific," she growled. "I am unsure if he will ever recover. His transformation so far is a miracle in itself."

Memories of evenings spent in motels, lying in bed, hearing the results of James' night terrors, his desperate tossing and turning, clawing at her in the early hours of the morning, suddenly came to mind. Memories of how desperately she wanted to reach out and help him, how powerless she felt as she watched him suffer, too afraid of her own abilities to try and temper his pain. Memories of the relief she felt when Steve would finally arrive and wake him, calming him, talking to him, reassuring his friends that he was finally free.

"He had help."

"From Captain Rogers, yes. It is a shame that he is no longer around to assist in his further rehabilitation."

It was, she agreed silently. After everything Steve had done for the universe, he deserved to have peaceful, private retirement, he truly did, but it, unfortunately, meant that James' lifeline for the past few years was now no longer around. He couldn't rely on his best friend to be there for him whenever he needed him. He and Sam were close, close enough to be trusted teammates, but their relationship simply didn't accommodate that kind of deep trust. The two would fight together any day, but when it came to relying on each other emotionally… that just wasn't how they worked.

He had no one. He was alone. Except, Wanda knew, he wasn't. He wouldn't be.

"What if I helped?"

Shuri glanced at her, a brow raised.

"You would be willing?"

Wanda turned, meeting her eyes and nodding resolutely.

"Absolutely."

Her scepticism slowly turned into curiosity.

"Am I correct in thinking that you possess telepathic abilities?" she asked.

"You are," Wanda replied.

Shuri's brow furrowed as she weighed their options.

"It is risky," she eventually said, "but for his sake, I am willing to try it. We will need to study your powers before allowing you to use them on Barnes."

"You do?"

"No offence," she added, "but the last thing he needs is someone interfering with his mind too heavily."

"I'd be gentle," Wanda insisted.

"I know, but if you misjudge your own strength, even a little bit, it could undo years of progress. I cannot afford to risk Barnes' health, or your's for that matter," she said firmly.

Wanda nodded in resignation.

"I understand."

It frustrated her, yes, but Wanda knew better than to assume she was more qualified than the young prodigy by her side. This girl had done more for James than she could have imagined possible. If there was anyone who could trust with his mental health, it was Shuri.

"Why are you helping him?" the girl in question asked casually. Wanda side-eyed her, her eyes narrowing.

"Why wouldn't I?"

"I mean beyond it being the right thing to do," Shuri explained. "Who is he to you?"

"A good friend," Wanda answered a little bit too quickly.

"Is that all?"

"Why do you ask?" Wanda retorted.

"Because if you go through with this," Shuri replied, a strange look in her eye, "if we allow you to go into his mind and see what was done to him, the two of you might become something far more than just 'good friends'."

"If my powers can help him, in any way," Wanda insisted, "then that's something I'm more than willing to risk."

"Very well," Shuri surrendered. "Don't say I did not warn you."

Wanda decided to ignore her warning.

"When can we start?"

Shuri shrugged.

"Right now, I suspect."

Wanda's gaze returned past the glass pane in front of her, into the lab, where James was now being examined by two physicians, his eyes staring forward vacantly. The spark that would inhabit them every time he smiled at her was now missing, making all the easier to believe that he was older than he looked. Wanda decided, then and there, that James' face looked far better when he was smiling, and anyway that she could make him smile often seemed like the obvious solution to that. If that meant aiding in his treatment, even if for the rest of his life, then that was what she would do.

"Then what are we waiting for?"


	7. Chapter 7

The sun rose on a quiet Wakandan morning, a beam of light shooting through the blinds into Wanda's bedchambers. She opened her eyes blearily, taking a moment to adjust to her surroundings. She sat up, scanning the room. She was alone, just as she had been when she fell asleep the night before. Alone. Except, she wasn't alone, because the room just next to her's was where James had slept. For some reason, that simple fact eased her nerves considerably.

She shook her head, palming the sides of her temples, groaning at herself. Why did she feel these things every time that man crossed her mind? It was a dizzying mixture of guilt, relief, pain and joy all rolled up into one. Why was it that every time he smiled her way she felt so wrong for enjoying it? Like a chain around her neck being yanked, forcefully and painfully, and the face of her beloved appearing in the back of her every thought.

This room reminded her so much of that day. The gorgeous countryside only brought memories of those last few moments with him. What was worse was that she was the one who killed him. She was the one who had to end it. All the power she had at her disposal, and no matter how much she tried, the only thing she could do was destroy.

Perhaps that was why Wanda felt so at ease with James because he understood. Vision could never… he was perfect. He was a naive, young, innocent soul, a being who fascinated her to no end. His only sin had been an accident. Her's were all her own. Vision didn't have to live with blood on his hands. James did. James was like her, imperfect, rough, haunted, and yet he smiled brighter than anyone she had ever seen. When he truly smiled, it was like gazing into the morning sun, appearing over the horizon.

She snapped out of her illusion, readjusting her eyes, realising that she had been staring out of the window this whole time. Great, now she was seeing him in the landscape. She wondered privately if this was the first sign of an oncoming madness.

She quickly dressed, heading out into the dining room where a small selection of breakfast items was waiting for her. She sat, piling on an array of fruit and yoghurt and tucked in, putting her thoughts away for the moment. To her side lay a tablet, detailing the major news events of the past 24 hours - Wanda supposed that this was what T'Challa used instead of newspapers to keep himself informed. Nothing grabbed her attention outright, apart from a couple of articles detailing stories of families reunited after the snap, along with a few photos of people praising the Avengers for saving the day. Her eyes lingered on a little girl dressed in a red jacket far too big for her, her grin wide and toothy, her cheeks round and pudgy. She couldn't help but smile along with her.

Footsteps drew her attention towards the doorway, just in time to see James himself, carrying a backpack, arriving at the head of the table.

"Good morning, James," she said cheerfully.

"Morning, Wanda," he greeted back. "I'm heading down to my place to pack my things. I thought it might be a good time to give you that tour. If you want."

She nodded, pushing away her empty bowl.

"Sounds good," she agreed. She stood from her seat, checking herself over briefly. She ginned, noticing the tiny backpack he had strapped over his shoulder. "That's a small bag."

He smirked back.

"I didn't have much," he explained. "I didn't need much. You ready?"

Deciding not to waste his time by changing into a new outfit, Wanda nodded.

"Sure. Let's go."

It's a good thing she always had a preference for a pair of good boots.

* * *

The rest of the day was spent with James leading her around the countryside, past exotic fauna and flora, through beautiful pockets of natural beauty. Wanda had never been hiking before - her family could never afford holidays back when she was small - but if it was anything like this, she could definitely get used to it. She always needed a hobby outside of being a superhero, after all.

Eventually, the two of them came to an open field of long grass, a small, round hut with a thatched roof sitting in the middle, a herd of cows lazing inside a fenced-off area. A couple of young Wakandan children, who had been sitting on the branches of a large tree standing nearby, ran towards them or rather ran towards James, who laughed, ruffling their hair, patting them gently.

"What can I say? The kids love me," he quipped, causing her to giggle. The children turned towards her - she greeted them enthusiastically, putting on a little light show for their entertainment - before the two ran off into the trees, presumably back to the village they had passed a few minutes before.

"It's not much," James shrugged.

"It's not anything," Wanda teased. "Did you really live here?"

"I did," he nodded. "It is was nice though. It was peaceful. Quiet, too. You don't get that a lot nowadays."

"I suppose not." A thought quickly came to her, as she studied the outside of the hut. "How did you shower?"

He laughed, gesturing past the tree line.

"There's a waterfall nearby. "

"Did it work?"

"Well enough."

"And did you use tree sap as shampoo?"

"Would you think less of me if I said yes?"

She smiled, gently smacking his arm lightly.

The inside of the hut was just as basic as the exterior. A bed, a table, a shelf, a few small utensils and little else. The only source of light was the doorway, meaning that the hut was incredibly dark, dingy and cramped.

"What do you need from here anyway?" she asked.

"Just this." He picked up a small wooden bowl from the table, showing it to her. From the dim light of the midday sun filtering through the entranceway, it was clear that it had been clumsily carved, small chips scarring the inside. "It was the first thing I made after my therapy."

"I think it's beautiful," she whispered.

"No, you don't, but thank you for trying," he smiled. She rolled her eyes.

"No, I do, I do. It's cute," she insisted, which only caused him to laughed even harder. "Is that all?"

"Pretty much," he replied, stuffing the bowl into his bag.

"It's not a lot of stuff for a backpack," she noted. He glanced at her, his brow furrowing.

"Not it isn't," he said nonchalantly.

"We didn't come all this way for a bowl, did we?" she asked.

"Not exactly." He lead her out of the hut, past the meadow, into the trees. He turned back, taking her hand gently. "Follow me."

* * *

They no longer had a path to follow, only a direction. The way forward was much more difficult, what with trees and rocks in the way. Occasionally Wanda had to lift a heavy boulder or fallen trunk out of their way. James, however, seemed unperturbed, always knowing exactly where to go, and where to take them.

It lasted for about half an hour until they reached a small clearing in the forest. The city shone in the far distance. The window of a medical centre hung just above them on the cliffside. The canopy shielded them from the bright afternoon above.

"I know this place," Wanda whispered. She trod precariously across the dirt, taking in the surroundings. This is was it. She was sure of it. She had seen it enough times in her head. This was where Vision had died. "James, why are we here?"

"Because I know what you're doing," James said quietly, "with Shuri, I mean. I know how much you're trying to help me. I wanna return the favour."

She glanced at him, trying to keep herself composed.

"I don't understand."

He unloaded the backpack from his shoulder, letting it land gently on the ground.

"There's a reason I have this bag," he explained. "It's because of this."

He reached inside, presenting a small wooden box to her. She took with shaking hands.

"Open it," he offered.

She felt her fingers brush against the latch, unsealing the container. The lid opened, revealing the contents of the box. It was a stack of small photographs, none of them of people she recognised. As she flipped through them, one at a time, she noticed all of them were taken from inside a hospital, and each and every person in the images was beaming. Some were young, some were old, some men, some women. She looked back at James, her confused face prompting him to explain.

"After we disappeared," he began, "Steve told me that they held funerals, for all of us. All except Vision. Because of how he was made, when it came to the autopsy, the doctors who studied him found that his body…"

He sighed, struggling with how to phrase his next few words.

"It was unlike anything they had ever seen before. It was more than just metal. It behaved like a living organism. They felt that simply burying it would be a waste, one more tragedy than was needed.

"So, instead, they donated it to people, kids especially, who needed it the most - people with spinal injuries, delicate bones, skin deformities, amputees, cancer patients, anyone that conventional medicine had failed. Each one of those photographs are of people who are alive today only because of him, and who will carry a piece of him with them for the rest of their lives."

Wanda looked down at the photos in her hand, they're smiles suddenly far more intimate than before. She felt tears quickly begin to pool around her eyes, her voice starting to disappear as she trembled. She turned them in her hand, nothing for the first time that each of them had written a few words on the back.

"They've all written messages to him, to say thank you," Bucky explained, taking her hand in his comfortingly. "So, what we're gonna is we're gonna read them all, and then we're gonna bury this box in his name. We're gonna make this his legacy. I thought he'd appreciate this more than a coffin."

Her eyes found his, tears streaking down her face. A sob burst out from her throat as the composure she had desperately tried to cling on to shattered. Her arms wound themselves around his neck, pulling him into her embrace.

"Thank you," she whispered faintly. her gently wove his arm around her waist, rubbing her back softly.

"It's the least I could do."

They spent the rest of the day like that, sitting close together, reading through each of the messages, gazing at each of the photos, with James explaining who each person was and how Vision had helped them, even in death. It was a quiet, reflective time. Compared to the honorary funeral held for Pietro, just outside the Avengers compound, it was a much more personal affair. She knew that, if Vision had been there with them, he would have loved to read each of these notes. As the two of them sorted through more and more of the pictures, seeing how more and more people had been cured, Wanda thought back to what Bruce had said the morning before the battle of Wakanda. About how taking out the mind stone could leave only the best of Vision intact. She couldn't help but agree, because she realised, as they finished the last testimony, that it wasn't the mind stone that had cured all these people. It wasn't the mind stone that had given them all another chance at life.

The hole had been dug with a spare trowel James had packed. She offered to help, but James refused. She was almost glad he had, since she was emotionally exhausted from the cathartic ritual she had just experienced. Soon, though, the grave had been dug, and she placed the wooden box into the grave. It was subsequently covered, leaving a fresh patch of dirt as its only signifier. It wasn't enough.

"He needs a headstone," Wanda noted. James smiled.

"I thought of that," he reached back into his bag, producing a small stone marker. "I made this."

He placed it at the head of the grave, its face blank, except for one sentence:

__Here lies Vision.__

"I didn't know what to put so…"

Wanda took a step forward, her hand glowing.

"I do."

She waved her hand across its face, chipping away at the stone, revealing a brand new message:

__Here lies Vision.__

__A hero. An Avenger.__

_"___I fight on the side of life."__

"Beautiful," James said. Wanda smiled, leaning against his shoulder.

"Thank you, James," she said softly. "He'd be proud of this."

"He'd be proud of you," he insisted, earning a beaming smile that left him speechless. It was as the sun began dipping over the mountainscape in the distance when he gave Wanda a gentle nudge. "We better get going. It's a long walk."

Wanda gave the headstone one last glance, remembering the best of times. The pair turned, walking away from the grave, back towards civilisation, hand in hand.

* * *

The two didn't leave each other's sides, not until they had made their way back to the palace, right up to the moment they had reached the door to Wanda's bedchambers. They hadn't done it purposefully, it was more out of instinct rather than any intentional gesture from either side. Either way, here they were, standing side by side, facing Wanda's door, ready to bid parting.

Wanda glanced at him, smiled graciously.

"I can't thank you enough for this, James. You have no idea how much this meant to me."

"It's my pleasure," he grinned. "I'm sorry that we had to do it in the first place. I'm sure Vision was a great guy."

"He was," she agreed.

"You… deserve a great guy," he said hesitantly.

"You got any in mind?" she teased, her laughter fading when she noticed the sincerity in his face.

"I…" he paused, staring deep into her eyes. His grip on her arm felt all the more pronounced. She gazed up at him, studying him, trying to block out the turmoil of emotion that was erupting in his mind. Against her better judgement, she peeked inside for just a moment.

A wave of intense desire crashed into her, pushing her back. She gasped, taking quick steps backwards, pulling herself out of his grasp. The emotion scattered, leaving her mind free. She froze, realising what she had done. She looked back at him to find his brow furrowed, his eyes wide.

"Are you ok?"

His plea echoed in her head like bells. He knew. He knew she had looked inside his head. He knew.

"Yes, I'm fine," she quickly sputtered. Her hand found clumsily the doorknob and pushed, opening the door. "I'll see tomorrow."

He nodded dutifully.

"I'll… see you tomorrow."

She reluctantly broke eye contact, fumbling into her room and closing the door. She slumped against the frame, her head in her hands, screaming internally. She had just invaded her teammate's head, seen something she had no right to see. Why had she done that? What made her think she could violate that kind of trust?

Just because she had formed an unhealthy attachment to him didn't give her the right to view expose his secrets. Just because she had grown more and more emotionally reliant on him didn't grant her access to his psyche.

This was so much easier with Vision, at least he could block her out.

Vision. Oh, god. She had only buried him today and already she was turning to another man, even if only for comfort. And the worst part was she wanted it. She wanted to violate James, she wanted to find out how he ticked, all his darkest secrets. She thought he was her's to fix.

Like he would ever agree to that; as if he even cared about her at all. No, she rationalised, James didn't care about that much. He only kept her company, checked up on her, comforted her in the night, fought beside her, defended her, helped her bury and say goodbye to her loved one… he allowed her to call him James.

Who was she kidding? Of course, he cared about her. It was obvious. She was one of his special few. And she had thrown that right back at his face because she couldn't contain herself.

She knew he wanted her, it was clear as day, despite his best attempts to hide it, to hold ace to aide her own grief, for her sake. And the truth - the horrible, horrible truth - was that a part of her wanted him, too.

"I'm sorry, Vis," she whispered to herself. "I can't do this. I'm sorry."

* * *

At the crack of midnight, in the small patch of pastures, a hand broke the earth. Its fingers felt the breeze of the late night air and wriggled with renewed life. Moving with impossible vitality, it burrowed its way upwards, it twin soon joining it above the surface of the dirt, pushing upward, ascending its owner the grass, into the moonlight. With an eruption of soil, a head broke into the world. Gasping desperately, crawling out from the tunnel it created, it collapsed into a pile of living bones and muscle. Shivering in the cold, revelling in the feeling of cold after so long, the body crawled into a fetal position, lying against the blades, shuddering out each and every subsequent breath. In and out, in and out, lungfuls of air for the first time in so long. His bony fingers clung around a clump of grass and dirt. This was real. He was out. He was alive.

A harsh fell upon him, filtering through his eyelids, emerging out of the darkness, along with the sounds of rushed footsteps, and a voice. He should get up. He should run. He should do something. He couldn't, even if he wanted. His muscles were too weak, his mind too tired to fight. Whatever torture they could have for him, it wouldn't be worse than the hell he had just escaped from.

He felt a hand lift his arm away from his face, and another turning his head outwards the light. He risked lifting his eyelid by a sliver, but he could see nothing beyond the blinding light that was beaming down upon him.

"Report!" the garbled sound of a radio pierced the sound of the winds through his ears.

"My god," the man above him breathed, his voice shaking, either from the cold or from the shock. "W-We're gonna need a medical team… immediately…"

"What is it?" the radio replied.

"If I told you, you wouldn't believe me. Just get a medic out here right now, and call Dr Banner. He's gonna wanna see this."

The name is familiar. It brings memories of a time long thought lost. He raises his hands, grabbing at whatever face is making these noises, but the hands that have moved him into the light are now shifting him onto his side, easing down into a more comfortable position.

"Easy bud," it says. "Easy there. Just relax."

He doesn't know how much time passes. Seconds? Minutes? Hours? It all ends in the heavy thuds along the grass, like an impossibly large, impossibly heavy man walking towards them.

"Dr Banner," the voice greets. He barely has enough energy left in his muscles to look up and verify it.

"Officer," the voice of Dr Bruce Banner replies. "Who is he?"

"He's… just take a look…"

He feels the light hit him again at full force and he feels exposed. It's several moments before Dr Banner responds to his face, but by then he's already fading back into unconsciousness. The last snippets of conversation he hears before going under is a strangled gasp.

"Is he alive?"

"He is. How?"

"I don't know... It's not possible..."


	8. Chapter 8

Another day, another gorgeous morning in the hidden jewel of Africa, and Sam was glad to be an audience to it. Standing on the balcony accompanying his room, he allowed himself a moment to gaze upon the mid-morning sun, the lists of the previous night just starting to depart.

He was happy to have a brief moment of peace. Travelling across the globe for days on end had left him a little antsy. It was relaxing not having to think about schedules and flight patterns. No, today was another day where he could relax, take in the sights, keep to himself for a bit.

He expected that Wanda and Barnes were doing just that as well. They indeed spent a lot of time together the previous day, and Sam suspected why. When Barnes had proposed his idea to him, Sam had been delighted to help. A quiet, personal little funeral for Vision was a brilliant idea, not only as a way to honour the fallen Avengers but also to allow Wanda a time to mourn. Sam just hoped it had all gone to plan. When he had last seen Barnes, the previous evening, his face didn't precisely communicate success. One of the most accomplished marksmen of the 20th century, a war hero, and he still had trouble with women. He and Steve had a lot more in common than they probably would like to admit.

Steve. It all came back to Steve in the end. Sam hadn't seen him for weeks, now - nearing a month. It was unsettling being separated from the man for so long, especially after two long years of being on the run with him and Natasha. Now the two of them had a life of their own. Thank god. Thank god that the three of them survived after all. Thank god Steve and Nat finally opened their eyes and did something with the time they had left. His thoughts drifted back to the pair, wondering how the two of them spent their mornings if they were anything like the scene right in front of him.

"How is he?"

Sam turned, spotting T'Challa at the doors of the balcony area. Before he could ask who the king was referring to, he continued. "Rogers, I mean. Is he enjoying his retirement?"

T'Challa grinned at Sam's confusion.

"Don't act surprised. People like Steve Rogers don't just disappear for no reason." The king leant against the railing, casually dismissing he could have possibly deduced a secret so well-kept. "I'm glad he has found peace."

Sam looked outward, in the same direction, watching the trees sway on the hillside.

"So am I."

"I am concerned, however," T'Challa added. "Rogers was a lonely man. Solitude would only exacerbate that."

"It's a good thing he's not alone."

T'Challa smiled.

"Romanoff?"

Sam chuckled.

"How could you possibly know that?"

"I know them," T'Challa replied. "Do you really think either could be content without the other? They are intertwined."

"I'm sure they are," Sam scoffed, trying to flush some particular images out of his mind.

A vibration from his pocket drew his attention to his mobile, which he withdrew from his pocket. The screen had lit up with Bruce's contact.

"Sorry, I've gotta take this," Sam explained. He pressed the 'accept' icon and held it up to his ear. "Bruce, what's up?"

Even though the phone's speakers were being muffled by Sam's cheek, T'Challa could tell that whoever was speaking from the other side - presumably Bruce - was speaking hurriedly and frantically.

"Woah, Woah, slow down," Sam urged. The garbled voice of Bruce replied quickly. Sam's casual ministration stopped. His body halted entirely. "What, you mean…? Holy shit… Alright, we're coming. We'll be back by this afternoon. Yeah? Okay."

He pocketed the phone, his eyes wide.

"We need to leave immediately."

"What's wrong? Is there an emergency?"

"I don't… I'm not sure I can even describe it. I need to find Bucky and Wanda fast."

T'Challa straightened up, bringing himself to the stance of a king.

"I'll have the Quinjet prepared as soon as possible."

Sam nodded, a genuinely gracious look in his eyes.

"Thank you."

* * *

Wanda had precisely one thing she knew she had to do today. One thing and one thing only. An apology, to her teammate. To James. It was simple; just walk up to him, apologise, smile, maybe even a hug, and then things would go back to normal. It was simple. So simple, she could do it in her sleep. So why was it that that straightforward idea was making her heart run rampant in her chest? Why did the very thought of James Barnes make her stomach tit into her knots? She knew why, of course. It was the slim but genuine possibility that things wouldn't go back to normal. That small, but all too imaginable chance of him deciding he wanted nothing to do with her. She couldn't quite describe why the resentment of James Barnes caused her such distress. All she knew was that she needed to make things right. Even if he didn't feel the same way, she needed to rid herself of this guilt that manifested inside her like a disease.

Of course, the first step of that plan would be locating him, as soon as possible. Wanda was glad then when she found that James had not gone on a hike around the countryside, as she feared, but instead was sitting in the common room of the royal quarters, casually reading the news. For a moment, she was tempted to leave. It would be so easy to simply run away as fast as she could, to fly away from her problems. But then she wouldn't be an Avengers if she took the easy way out. Wanda approached, treading carefully as if one worn footstep would somehow set him off. As if James were the type to erupt. His head arose from his tablet. He smiled at her, and her insides began to glow.

"James," she greeted.

"Wanda," he replied. He placed the table ton the coffee table, rising to meet her properly, towering above her. "How are you feeling?"

The plan collapse in the face of his warm demeanour. She went immediately to the last step, rushing into his arms, wrapping herself around him.

"Woah, hey…" he whispered.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have looked. That was none of my business."

He sighed and patted her back gently.

"It's okay."

"No, it's not," she insisted.

"You're gonna get in there eventually," he argued, before grinning." I'd rather have you in there than anyone else."

"That's for your therapy, James," she retorted, stepping out of his arms. "That's for you. What happened last night was my fault, it was for my own benefit. I violated your trust."

"No, you didn't," he sighed.

"I did!" she exclaimed, angrier at herself than at him. He shook his head, wearily.

"You're starting to sound like me now."

She paused, allowing him time to beckon her over.

"Come here." Hesitantly, she approached him. Once she was close enough, he raised her hand to his temples. "Look inside, properly this time."

She gazed anxiously up at him.

"Are you sure?"

He pressed her palms against the sides of his head.

"Absolutely."

And that was all she needed. She urged her thought into the tips of her fingers, and her hands glowed a bright red, illuminating the pair of them.

"I'll try not to see any private memories."

He smirked, closing his eyes, readying himself.

"I'll try not to think of them."

She took a deep breath, her pupils fluttering into the back of her head as she dived deep into his brain. Images of her from the view of an outsider, looking in, each one coated in scarlet light.

The first was of her in a prison cell, wrapped in a straight jacket, her eyes gazing outwards and unseeing. A deep feeling of rage and empathy flooded her, and she wished she had knocked each of those guards a little harder- no, he wished. She had to remind herself whose thoughts were whose before she went too deep.

She sees herself sitting on a motel bed with her knees tucked under her chin, looking so unbelievably fragile. She's a far cry from the strong, awe-inspiring woman who had fought beside him at the airport. This is the portrait of a broken young girl, abused, abandoned, still reeling from her time in the Raft. The urge to go over to her, to comfort her is overwhelming, but he knows better. She doesn't want his pity, he's the reason why she was captured in the first place. He's the reason why she's suffered so much. She wants to scream at him, to tell him it's not true that she never thought ill of him, but she can't speak to the past. She can only stroke her thumb against his temple and continue to delve deep.

The next memory is of her training alongside him, trading blow for blow. The first time she manages to topple him sends a surge a pride though him. He grins up at her, and the faint smile he gets in reply lights up his world. She shows him her powers, the bleeding red energy that entrances him, and she got it. Suddenly this shared connection feels all the more personal. The more he learns about her, the more he sees his distorted twin. His beautiful, young, distorted twin. Unlike him, however, there's still good left in her. He swears to himself that she will never suffer in the same way he has. Never.

When he finally awakes from cryo-sleep, she's there to greet him. Her tight hug makes him feel all the warmer after his long slumber. She tells him about Vision, about how he understands her and makes her feel normal. He makes her feel happy. A dangerous flurry of thoughts crosses his brain - jealousy, anger, paranoia. This is the robot - no, not a robot, a person - who tried to stop them only a few months before. Who fought them, attempted to crush him with an air control tower. But that's not true. No one wanted to fight that day, not really. Especially not Vision, the man who tried to talk them out of it. He stows away his feelings, deciding to feel happy for her in turn, crushing what little hope he had for anything between them. She chose Vision, not him. A voice in his head tells him it was only inevitable. What was there to love about him? This hollow shell of a man, a broken weapon from another era. All he did was cause destruction. Except for her. Everything he did for her seemed to help her. He helped her to train, to fight, to grow, to recover. So that's what he would do. He would help her, for as long as drew breath.

A bellowed cry brings her to that awful day. He sees her, terrified, standing beside a weakened Vision. Thanos eyes them, swatting away Bruce, Steve, T'Challa, getting closer to the two of them, grinning like a predator eyeing his prey. A burning hatred fills every fibre of his being. He rushes from the undergrowth, his sub-machine gun raised, his sights set on the alien bastard. He barely notices the recoil, his scream of fury blocking out the fire. Not a single bullet touches Thanos. All of a sudden, he's blasted aside, hurled into the side of a nearby tree trunk. He tries to get up, only to see his leg lodged beneath a fallen tree. By the time his leg comes free, Thanos has Vision in his hands. He plucks the mind stone from his head, and Vision sees no more. The colour drains from his body, and he drops, lifeless, his glass eyes staring directly at him as if pleading to him, asking why he didn't do more. Wanda's sobs fill his ears, and his heart breaks. The depth of his failure catches up with him. Her entire world is gone because he didn't fight hard enough.

The feeling of his body turning to dust doesn't faze him. Why should it? They failed - all because of him. He was the reason the Avengers were disassembled, violently and ruthlessly. He was the reason why their last line of defence had been scattered. This was his fault. Of all the people who deserved to go, of course, he was one of them. He falls, disappearing before he hits the ground.

And then he's back. And he's walking through a portal in a war-torn landscape, and Steve is there, leading the charge. He sees Wanda in the distance, contorting Thanos' body like a puppet cut from its strings, utterly helpless and screaming. He smiles. Serves the purple son of a bitch right.

It all falls away, and they're staring side by side at the funeral. She stays close to him throughout the ceremony, never straying far. He wants to take some kind of satisfaction from that, but he can't. Because the love of her life is still dead. He refuses to gain any sort of pleasure from her misfortune. He rubs shoulders with, sending her a reassuring look. The small smile in return isn't much, but it means the world to him. He endeavours to make sure she smiles more often.

He asks Sam for help, discussing the funeral, how to support her during this pivotal time of grieving. He follows his advice to a 't', making her feel loved and appreciated, respecting her personal space, including her as often as possible. In turn, she becomes closer to him. She becomes much more comfortable with physical contact. Her hand on his arm as she guides him down the streets of San Francisco gives him a warm, fuzzy feeling of home. He gives her blessing to call him James, and every time she does his heart skips a beat. Every time she looks at him and sees him, beyond his past, beyond his weakness, he feels like a new man. He feels like James Barnes again.

A gasp pulls them both from his head. It takes a moment for her to readjust to her own sense of self. Her hands on his temples reintroduce her to physical sensation, the feeling of skin and hair anchors her back in the here and now.

Her eyes meet his, and she realises that tears are running down her cheeks.

"James…"

His hands flew to her before she could pull away, cupping her cheeks.

"You see now?" he chuckled, his eyes shining. "I care about you, Wanda, and I want you to know I will always be there for you. Always."

Despite his voice so low that it was barely a whisper, it rang in her ears like a choir.

"Why did you show me all this?"

"To prove to you that I'm not in this for me," he explained. "I'd rather you be happy than be mine."

Wanda sometimes wished she could see herself as the Scarlet Witch, to understand what warranted her nickname, what terrified and enchanted so many at once. However, at that moment, she realised that gazing into James' bright blue eyes, burning with a passion and honesty unparalleled was the closer she was ever going to get. Wanda stretched up onto her toes, pressing a small kiss on his cheek, holding herself there for as long as she dared. She noticed as she leaned back, that his eyes had fluttered closed, and suddenly a sense of calm sunk back into her system.

"I'm not saying no, James," she said fondly. "I just need time."

He didn't react, his face barely changed at all. He only nodded gently, the corners of mouth turning upwards in a placating smile.

"That's all I can ask."

"Guys." The strained voice of Sam interrupted, drawing their attention immediately to the other side of the room. His posture was stiff, alert, and his heavy breathing showed he had clearly been running only moments before. "We're heading back."

"What, now?" Bucky asked.

"Yeah, now."

"How come?" Wanda said. "Is everything alright?"

"I'll explain on the way," he replied. "Get yourselves packed and ready in five. Let's go!"

* * *

It was lucky that Wanda had only brought the bare essentials for her trip, otherwise [acking might have taken far too long for Sam's liking. Something had clearly riled him up, causing him to her and James them around like disobedient troops. It would have been annoying, but she had no idea what had triggered Sam's distress. For all she knew, the world was ending. Besides, she knew better than to doubt Sam's intuition. He was their leader. He knew what he was doing, even when they didn't.

"Remember, small increments," Shuri reminded Wanda she escorted her to the airstrip, imparting some last-minute advice for James' therapy sessions. "You need to be gentle."

Shuri handed her a large binder, bursting with notes.

"Start with the exercise in this guide book, they should help you both begin to make progress."

"Thank you, Shuri," she said, origin the king's sister into a warm embrace. "Let's hope a Nobel prize is in your future."

"You think I should apply?"

Wanda smiled

"It's worth a shot."

Shuri scoffed.

"It's only fame, wealth, recognition. I have all three."

Wanda could only bow her head.

"Very wise of you," she conceded.

"Although," she pondered, "I do have an empty space on my shelf…"

A quick glance from the other sent the tow young woman into a fit of giggles. The pair embraced one last time.

"Take care, Wanda."

"You too Shuri," she echoed, releasing her, making her way into the bowels of the Quinjet. "Don't let T'Challa drive you crazy."

"From what I've heard he's your problem now," she shot back as the holding bay doors closed, blocked her from view.

"Alright boys," Wanda bounced her presence to the two men standing beside the cockpit, "let's get moving. I dibs the right bunk."

She paused when neither of two reacted, continuing to speak in hushed tones, too quiet for her to hear. It was only as she walked through the interior, closer to the pair, that she started to pick up on their conversation.

"Is he sure?"

"He sounds pretty sure."

James began to rub the back of his neck, anxiously.

"How did it even happen?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Sam exclaimed in a whisper, gesturing wildly. "I don't think even Bruce knows."

"Jesus Christ. Well, how are we gonna tell Wanda?"

"Tell me what?"

The look on their faces should have been comical - a potent blend of shock, embarrassment and shame. For some reason, it wasn't. A strange sinking feeling had drained the humour out of them. Now, when she looked upon their anxious, wide-eyed faces, it was like looking at a bad omen in the dead of night. Something was wrong.

"I'll… get us in the air," Sam excused himself quickly.

And with that, their glorious leader bounced from the station entirely, leaving only an increasingly nervous Bucky at her mercy.

"James," she urged, her voice riding a fine line between threatening and pleading, "what's going on?"

"Not now," he explained. "We'll tell you once we're off the ground."

Her eyes narrowed.

"Why?"

"Because Sam knows more about it than I do," he replied.

"Is it bad?"

His brow furrowed.

"We don't think so," he said hesitantly. "We really don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?"

"Please," he begged. "Once we're airborne. Then we'll tell you everything."

And so she waited. She waited as they taxied across the runway, fired up the airstrip, powered into the air and safely manoeuvred through the secret barrier. She waited until Sam packed in the autopilot to take over as they cruised through African airspace, on route back to the compound in New York. She waited until the turbulence came to a halt as they breached the cloud barrier. Then, deciding to wait no longer, she stood, unbuckling herself and cornering the two before they could escape.

"Tell me what's going on," she ordered. "Now."

"This is gonna be tough," Sam sighed.

"Then just spit it out," Wanda growled.

"I can't," he retorted with a ferocity that renders her speechless. He cringed, taking a second to collect himself. "Last night, security found a body on the perimeter of the compound."

Wanda squinted.

"A body?"

"A male, mid-20s," he elaborated. "He's still alive, but he's in critical condition. Bruce said he's recovering, though. They've got him in the med bay for now. "

"Who is he?"

Neither answered, but the look that transpired between the two of them spoke more far more words could.

"James… Who is he?"

James trained his nerves, staring her straight in the eye. Whatever she expected him to say, it wasn't what came out of his mouth only a second later.

"It's your brother."

It came like a punch in the face, so suddenly that her brain struggled to keep up, with such force that she had been left reeling, stunned. She flinched.

"P…Pietro?" she asked as if she had misheard. They didn't correct her, they barely even moved. They just kept staring at her with that same intensity that made her feel like she was two inches tall. "That's not funny, guys."

"We're not joking," Sam replied in a grave voice. "When they went to check on his grave, they found the ground had been disturbed. The casket had been broken open from the inside."

The image of her brother clawing at the inside of his coffin, screaming to be let out, so similar to the scene that had tormented her nightmares, resurfaced in her mind. The face of Pietro, pale and skeletal, glaring at her from the darkness. Her balance began to fall away as her world start to crumble from beneath her.

"Wanda?" James' voice was like a distant memory as her vision began to cloud over and star formed in front of her eyes. Before she could collapse, she felt her head being pushed down between her knees, a hand that she knew belonged to James, holding back her hair just in case. "It's okay. Just breathe. Nice deep breaths."

She gasped rather than breathed, in shallow, shuddering sobs, but slowly, as the blood came back to her head, her sight returned along with it.

"It's not him," she whispered desperately. "It can't be him."

"We didn't believe it either," Sam said. "Bruce swears he's telling the truth. They've run full DNA scans, forensic investigations, even brain analysis. It's him."

Despite feeling like her head was to spin right off her shoulder, Wanda chanced to look up at him, locking eyes with Sam.

"I need to see him," she pleaded. Sam nodded.

"That's why where we're going," he explained.

"Why only tell me this now?" she asked once she got her breath back.

"They only found him a couple of hours ago," he replied earnestly. "I only just heard about it. As soon as I did, I came to find you both."

"He only told me before take-off," James offered, his hand moving to her back to rub it in a calming fashion. "We wanted you on the plane before we gave you the news."

"Why?"

Sam gave a small, genuine smile.

"Because we knew that once we told you, there'd be nothing we could do to stop you from flying there yourself."

* * *

By the time they had reached the compound, after the far too long ten-hour trip from Wakanda to New York, it was still only midday, proof that this was indeed going to be one of the longest days of Wanda's life, as much as she already felt like. A billion questions had shot through her head during those ten tortuous hours onboard the Quinjet. Most of them stated how. All of them ended up only bringing more questions, with few answers to show for it.

She was confused, she was tired, but most of all she was nervous. God, was she nervous. If Bruce was telling the truth - and he had better be telling the truth because if not there would be no force on earth that be able to protect him from her wrath - she was about to see her twin brother again, the one she was lost to her forever. Nothing - nothing - could have prepared her for this. There was no protocol for resurrection, of all things. Was thing what it like seeing all those people, her included, reappear after five long years?

Before she could ponder the issue further, she was drawn out her thoughts by a hand slowly grasping her's. She didn't have to turn around to know whose it was. Only one person in the world held her with such care.

"Whatever happens," James said with a soft but reassuring whisper, "I'm here."

And just like that, her fear turned into determination. She was ready. Except…

"Do you think he'll remember me?" It was a stupid question, she knew, but it was one that had found its way into her mind and had refused to leave, burrowing deep into her thoughts like a parasite. To be honest, compared to all the people who could possibly answer that question, James was the least likely of them to know. But he was James. He could tell the sky was green and she would trust it.

He turned to her, squeezing her hand, gazing at her as a parent would to their nervous child.

"I'm willing to bet you're the only thing on his mind."

And for the first time since they had left Wakanda, she smiled. And she meant it.

The holding bay doors opened, revealing Bruce, waiting for them on the landing pad. Disengaging from Jame, she stormed ahead, barely sparing the hulking doctor a glance.

"Where is he?"

"Med bay," he answered without missing a beat. "I'll take you to him. Fair warning, he's slightly delirious. We've tried putting him to sleep, but he's adamant on seeing you."

That sure sounded like Pietro, she'll give him that.

She strode through the complex, barely slowing down for a second until she reached the doors to the medical centre. From there she allowed Bruce to guide her to a curtained-off section, where the slow, repetitive beep of a heart rate monitor drummed in the background. Carefully, he pulled back the curtain, revealing the hospital bed, and the man who occupied it.

She gasped.

For some reason, it had never occurred to her that in order to see her brother again, she would actually have to see him. Perhaps that was why, when her eyes came to rest on that familiar face, it took a moment for her to register what she was seeing. He was pale, extremely pale, and skinny. His eyes, dark and slightly sunken, his hair matted and slick with dirt. But it was him. Lying in front of her was her brother. He was alive.

"Pietro…"

His eyes opened, and he smiled weakly, bringing some much-needed life back into his complexion.

"Hey, sis…" he croaked. His voice was small and weak, but it held the same Sokovian accent that was a mirror of her own from so long ago. His smile was the same crooked smile that had punctuated his every deed. It all suddenly came crashing down on her and tears began to slide down her face, blurring her sight.

"Oh my god…"

She rushed to him, pulling his frame into a gentle hug, squeezing a small chuckle out of him.

"Is it true that you're an Avenger, now?" he grinned.

She pulled back, holding his face in her hands.

"You're alive."

"Yeah," he shrugged. "Doesn't feel like it, but I am."

"I've missed you so much," she cried.

He laughed, trying to disguise the sight shimmer that had appeared at the edge of his eyes.

"I've missed you too, sis."

"You're so pale," she lamented.

"Well, I've haven't been getting much sun recently. Being dead and all," he replied sarcastically. His eyes widened. "Does this make me divine?"

She ignored his remark, turning to Bruce, who was standing off at the side.

"How is he alive?"

"I don't know for sure," he said. "I have a theory."

"We all do," Sam remarked, alerting Wanda to the fact that he and James had finally caught up to her, and were standing at the foot of Pietro's bed.

"I checked the medical records from before he was buried," Bruce explained. "The autopsy said he died from bullet wounds to vital organs. He was declared dead at the scene. So, then I checked the medical reports from his time under Strucker."

"And?" Wanda prompted.

"And I don't think he died." Their stunned silence encouraged him to elaborate. "Pietro isn't just fast, his cellular biology works at a speed unprecedented. When they performed the autopsy, they said they made a large incision down his torso. Check it again."

Sure enough, when she loaned his hospital gown and inspected his chest, all that's revealed was smooth, untempered skin.

"It's… gone," she noted.

"Precisely," Bruce exclaimed softly. "They didn't just speed up his movement, they sped up everything. His healing, his digestion, his metabolism, everything. He didn't die, he went into a healing coma. "

"If that's so, why they couldn't they tell he was still alive?" James asked, speaking for the first time since he arrived.

"Because he was practically dead already. His body had directed all of its energy into regenerating his cells, with only the tiniest fraction of it keeping his brain active. He must've gone into a vegetative state to stay alive, so close to death that nobody could tell he was still living."

"So, what changed?" Sam asked.

"The snap."

"The snap?"

"When Thanos snapped his fingers the first time-"

"I'm sorry, who's Thanos?" Pietro interrupted. Bruce continued regardless.

"- Pietro must have been one of those who disappeared. He was technically still alive, and therefore that made him eligible to vanish."

"You sure that's what happened?" Sam scoffed.

"When we dug up his casket to inspect it, we found traces of ash inside."

"So, then what happened?" Wanda chimed in.

"I brought everyone back," Bruce replied, "but that's not all, because when I snapped my fingers, I knew I couldn't just make the ashes reform into a human body, that wouldn't work. The shape would be correct, but they would be inanimate. So, instead, I compelled the stones to reform each of the vanished bodies, but to reform them in the peak of their health, alive and in a safe place. (I didn't want anyone who was driving a car or flying to suddenly find themselves on the motorway or in the air, after all.) When I did that, it must have reassembled Pietro's body, minus his injuries. They brought him back into prime condition; his cells did the rest."

Pietro looked seemingly content for a moment, nodding lazily, before shaking his head.

"Sorry, you lost me at 'Thanos'."

Wanda merely rolled her eyes.

"Do you remember what happened?" she asked.

"Not really…" His face scrunched up in concentration. "It's like a bad dream… then I woke up and I was in a coffin. I had to dig my way out."

He turned toward Bruce, giving him a gracious look.

"Thank you, Dr Banner."

"You're welcome, kid," Bruce smiled back. He sighed, shaking his head. "Christ, Barton is gonna have a fit."

"Barton?" Pietro's face lit up with recognition. "How is he, anyway?"

"He's retired."

"Really?" he nodded.

"And he named his kid after you."

Pietro paused, his face frozen as he processed the information.

"Oh," he merely said after a moment of thought. "I… didn't know he cared."

"We all did," Sam added. Pietro turned to and frowned.

"I'm sorry, who are you?"

"I'm Sam Wilson. This-"

"This is James," Wanda introduced, dragging him towards Pietro's bedside, "my… friend."

If Pietro noticed her hesitation, he didn't say anything about it. Instead, his attention switched to the man that stood flanked against his dear sister.

"James Barnes," he introduced himself. "Most called me Bucky."

Pietro's eyes widened.

"'Bucky Barnes'? The sidekick to-"

"To Captain Spangles, yes," he grinned. "The very same."

Pietro glanced at Wanda.

"You told him about Captain Spangles?" he teased.

"'Captain Spangles'?" Sam parroted in confusion.

"Steve," James explained. He paused, a thought lit up in his head, and he smirked. "Well, actually, now it's you."

He turned to Pietro, whose brow was furrowed form lack of understanding. This kid had missed out on a lot.

"Sam's the new Captain America," James revealed.

"Ha ha!" Wanda sung. "Sam's Captain Spangles!"

"No. That's not a thing," Sam blustered. "It will never be a thing."

James shook his head, a smug grin plastered on his face.

"It's a thing, bud."

Before Sam could protest any further, Pietro piped up.

"Anyone else back from the dead?"

The four around his bed shared a knowing look.

"You have no idea, kid," Bruce offered, causing a string of laughter to chorus around the room, sweeping up Pietro with it. After the peals of well-needed elation died down, Pietro sighed, beaming at his sister, who smiled right back.

"But, seriously, who's Thanos?"


	9. Chapter 9

Even in his haggard state, Bucky could see the family resemblance between Pietro and Wanda. His silver hair, sunken cheeks and darkened eyes certainly muddied the similarities between them, but beyond that, there was something about Pietro that reminded Bucky of his twin sister. Besides appearances, the way the two spoke to each other, how they responded to the other's presence; it all spoke a long and personal history that he wasn't privy to. He wondered if he and Wanda would ever share that kind of connection. Perhaps they could have. But now? With Pietro back? That prospect seemed so much harder. Now he wasn't the only important man in her life. Now…

He shook his head, turning away from the scene, scolding himself for making all about him. This was Wanda's happy moment. He should let her cherish it. If he really cared about Wanda, he would be satisfied. But he wasn't. As much Bucky wanted to say that he was perfectly fine, a sinking feeling pooling in the pit of his mind told him otherwise.

"Someone kick your dog?"

He glanced up, noticing that Sam had managed to creep up on him.

"Sorry?"

"You look down," Sam replied. "What's up?"

Bucky sighed, sinking his nails into his palm.

"I should be happy that she has her brother back, and I am, I really am." He trailed off.

"But?"

"She doesn't really need me anymore, does she?" he said, rhetorically. He shrugged with as little enthusiasm as he could muster. "She's got Pietro to look after her."

Sam squinted, crossing his arms.

"You talked to her about any of this?" he asked, gesturing to the woman question, still caught in conversation.

"No," Bucky insisted quietly, "of course not. She shouldn't have to worry about me. I don't want to ruin this for her, making her worry about my feelings in all of this."

Sam rolled his eyes.

"You really are the dumbest son of a bitch on the planet, you know that?"

Bucky glanced at him in disbelief, suddenly standing straighter.

"What?" he blustered, causing Sam to place both hands on his shoulders.

"She. Introduced. You," he said, shaking Bucky slightly with every word. "To Pietro of all people, to what's left of her family. I didn't get that honour, neither did Bruce. Only you, man. You know what that means? You're special to her. Really special. Special enough that she decided that Pietro, her brother, needed to know who you are."

He had a point. Of course he had a point. Even Bucky had noticed how enthusiastically she had dragged him to Pietro's bedside. He just refused to read anything into that. Because how could he be important, to anyone? He wasn't special, not to anyone, except maybe a few…

A memory glanced by, bringing him back to the Quinjet on their long flight to Norway. Her own words echoed out to him.

"One of the privileged few…" he whispered. A genuine smile rushed across his face like wildfire.

"Pardon?" Sam's question brought him back firmly into the present. He readjusted himself, patting his friend's shoulder.

"You're right," he replied. "You're always right."

Sam grinned, waving him off.

"That's why I'm the Captain."

"Yep," Bucky smirked right back. "Captain Spangles."

"Shut up."

"You know that's not going away any time soon?"

"Then I guess I'll just have to make a few changes to the training regime, won't I?" Sam pondered out loud. "How about a few dozen extra laps around the compound, huh?"

"This is tyranny now," Bucky protested. "I thought Captain America was against tyranny."

"Let's not call it tyranny," Sam retorted casually. "Let's call it selective discipline."

"Jesus…" Bucky chuckled, feeling his legs ache preemptively. A sound of laughter pulled him back to the twins. Pietro had presumably told a funny joke, or another old memory the two shared, and Wanda had responded with one her typical giggles - a sound that made Bucky's shortlist of the most beautiful noises in the world. Seeing the young man again, however, raised one question in his mind. "You think Pietro's gonna join us?"

"Honestly, I don't know," Sam sighed. "He's a loose cannon as far as I'm concerned."

"So was Wanda for a time," Bucky noted, "but here she is."

Sam didn't reply, not immediately. Instead, he took to gazing across the med bay, back towards the pair. His eyes were distant, his jaw clenching in thought.

"I'll guess we'll just have to wait and see."

* * *

It was amazing, even to Wanda, how much Pietro had missed out on her life. Though he had only been absent for three years, so much had happened in those three years that it was almost too much to convey. She felt like a completely different person from the young woman that had joined up with Ultron all the years ago. Now, she had gone from hating the Avengers and everything they stood for to being one of the few remaining members of the team. Her view on Tony Stark especially had done a complete 180. A few years ago the notion of Tony Stark sacrificing anything of his was one she would have scoffed at, but now…

"Stark is dead?" Pietro asked her during one of her many visits to his bedside.

"Yes," she replied, fiddling with a stray button on her blouse. "He saved the universe, Pietro."

"He didn't seem the type," he said, but even he seemed unconvinced. His eye gained a steely look. "I want to pay my respects."

"You will," she assured him, patting his arm, "once you're healthy."

Pietro sighed, his head flopping back onto his pillow. Wanda could see a hint of regret permeating his face, causing his brow to crease and his jaw to tighten.

"I was at his funeral," she said after a pause. "There were so many people, Pietro. People like us. Heroes."

He shook his head, chuckling.

"I'm no hero," he said, earning a light hit on the arm.

"You died, saving Clint's life. That makes you a hero in my book."

He studied for a moment, taking her in.

"You're so much more grown up," he said quietly, causing her to smile softly. "What happened to my little sister?"

"A lot," she sighed. "I became an Avenger, made a lot of mistakes, fell in love… I lost some people very close to me."

"Who?" he asked, sitting up as far as his condition would allow. "Who else did we lose?"

She inhaled, her head drooped, and her eyes fell to the floor. Her fiddling with the loose button became more erratic.

"Vision."

"That was the robot, right?" he said absently. Wanda's eyes narrowed. Her fingers clenched involuntarily. Her shoulders stiffened, and suddenly she felt her face flush with heat. He frowned. "What?"

"S'Nothing." She tried to dismiss it, she tried to act casual for her brother's sake because he didn't know, but her voice betrayed her. She had meant to sound aloof. Instead, she seemed agitated, frustrated, and Pietro noticed. Not wanting to argue with him, she stood to leave. "I need a break."

"What did I say?" he insisted. Wanda collected herself, trying to quell the sudden urge to shout. He didn't deserve it. He didn't know.

"He wasn't just a robot." She shook her head, desperate not to cry in front of her brother. "I'm sorry…"

And she left, just like that, leaving a deeply confused Pietro behind, all on his alone. She felt guilty, she admitted to herself once she was alone. She shouldn't have gotten so worked up over one word. It was true, Vision was a robot. There was nothing objectively false about that assessment. It still felt so wrong to her. Vision was never just a robot. He had fought so hard not to be 'just a robot'. Anyone who ever met him could attest to that. Anyone who had the pleasure of being saved by him knew that to be true.

But Pietro hadn't, Wanda scolded herself as she found her bedroom. Pietro had been deaduntil a days ago. As far as he knew, Vision was just a robot, only one of Ultron's failed experiments. She couldn't blame him for that. A new wave of tears stream down her face, and she collapses against the mattress. She feels exhausted, utterly spent. More than ever, after several sleepless nights and emotionally draining days in a row, she needed sleep.

* * *

It felt weird not having Wanda by his bedside anymore, Pietro thought. In her absence, Barnes has decided to keep him company. He was a good sport, always indulging his endless questions about the new world that he has been thrust into, but he hadn't a scratch on Wanda. Her anger towards him earlier in the day had been weighing on Pietro's mind a lot recently. As to what had caused it, he had only theories. All of them pointed back to Vision.

"Were her and Vision friends?"

Barnes put down the book he was reading and gave him a patient look.

"Bit more than friends, bud," he said, tilting his head for emphasis. Pietro's eyes widened.

"You mean…?"

"Yep."

The twin sagged. So, that explained it. God, he called him a robot. No wonder she was pissed. Was that a slur in this day and age? Was that racist? Was he racist? He didn't think he was racist.

"Were they serious?" Pietro asked, desperate to move on from his mistake.

Barnes adopted a thousand-yard stare, nodding distantly.

"They loved each other," he affirmed.

"As much as a toaster can love you back." The look that Barnes sent him in response made Pietro wonder if they had kept the casket. "Okay, I'm a dick, I'm sorry. It's just… unusual."

"I've seen weirder," he excused him begrudgingly.

"What happened to him?"

"You know the stone in his head?" Pietro nodded. "Well, that put a target on his back. Thanos was going to tear the planet apart to get it. The stone had to be destroyed, and that meant killing Vision along with it. We ran out of time to find a solution, so we had to end his life. Wanda was the only strong enough to do it."

His eyes darkened grimly, his frown becoming all the more pronounced.

"She killed him?" Pietro gasped.

"To save the universe, yes."

Except Pietro could tell, there was something else behind that story. The parts just didn't add up, not yet.

"But it didn't work, did it?" He asked hesitantly. "There wouldn't have been a snap if it worked."

Barnes shook his head, his shoulders hunched. He simmered in quiet fury.

"Thanos used another stone to reverse time, bringing Vision back to life. Then he took the stone himself. By hand."

The memory of the yellow stone in the middle of Vision's forehead presented itself in Pietro's mind, so vividly that it was like he was in front of him.

"Right out of…?" Barnes nodded pointedly. Pietro's face turned pale - even more than it already was if it were even possible. "I feel sick."

"I know," Barnes growled. "And Wanda had to watch."

Pietro could practically see the terrified face his sister, watching helplessly as it happens. That haunted look in her eyes when she said his name suddenly took on a whole new meaning. Pietro clenched his fingers in the corners of his sheets, feeling the urge to punch something. Or rather, someone.

"Thanos…" he spat. "Bastard. No wonder they decided to kill him. I wanna kill the guy."

"Get in line," was Barnes' only response.

"Can't we use the stone he used to bring him back? Kill him again?"

"Not now we can't," Barnes shrugged. "Not since Steve returned them all."

"Where is he, by the way?" Pietro asked. "I'd thought he'd be here."

"Haven't you heard? He's retired, settled down - engaged, even."

"Let me guess," Pietro smirked, "to Black Widow?" He received a confused look in return.

"She's… not exactly around anymore, kid."

He remembered hearing about the death of the Black Widow, how she sacrificed herself to get the soul stone. 'A soul for a soul'; an 'eternal exchange', apparently. Yeah, right.

"I can buy a lot of things. Aliens, reality-warping stones, time travel, but Rogers settling down? Without Romanoff?"

"If you say so," Barnes said nonchalantly.

"Come on…" Pietro smirked playfully. Barnes considered for a moment, biting the inside of his cheek in internal debate. Eventually, though, he relented.

"Yeah, it's Romanoff."

"Knew it!" Pietro pumped his fist. "What can I say? I'm a genius."

"Sure you are, kid," Bucky scoffed.

"You know what else I figured out?" Pietro added.

"What?"

"That you and Wanda are a little bit more than friends."

The friendly grin on Barnes' face disappeared.

"That we are," he noted.

"So, what is it?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Barnes sighed, palming his forehead.

"Whatever it is, just…" Pietro put on a look that he hoped was intimidating. "Look after my sister, Barnes."

"I will."

"And if you don't… well," Pietro shrugged, "they won't find you. Ever."

The man by his bedside only smiled wearily.

"I wouldn't want to be found."

* * *

The Quinjet soared gently across the horizon, landing with all the grace of a majestic bird upon the landing pad. It was staggering how impressive of a machine it was, Bruce thought as he watched the plane slowly power down. It had made the 850-mile round trip to Missouri in barely a few hours, a jiffy compared to routine airline flights. There was a certain nostalgic quality to its design. It was certainly not the original craft - that had been lost in the attack on the compound - but it was reminiscent enough of the jet that had carted the original team around the world, enabling them to fight the good fight. Those were the days, indeed.

The person currently disembarking the plane, the reason for the jet's trip in the first place could undoubtedly relate.

"Bruce," the cheery voice of Clint Barton greeted him, reaching up to give him a pat on the shoulder. "Hey, bud."

Bruce squatted slightly, just enough to wrap his healthy arm around the archer, cherishing one of the few good friends he had left.

"Hey, Clint."

"How's the arm?"

Bruce shrugged, smiling absently.

"Getting better. Still sore."

"Can't say I'm surprised," Clint said in condolence. "I got your call. What's the emergency?"

"I'm sorry to do this, Clint," Bruce replied earnestly. "I promise you, it was urgent."

"It better be," Clint grumbled, clearly not as annoyed as he wanted to appear, "I was in the middle of lunch."

The pair walked side-by-side off of the landing area, through a couple of adjacent doors into the compound. Clint took a moment to take it all in again. They had done a stand-up job of rebuilding the place, sparing no detail when it came to recreating the original. It was all still here, the tables, the glass canopy, the obnoxious houseplants, the couches. It was lightly populated with a few staff that were needed to keep the place running, busying themselves with whatever task had been assigned to them. A silver-haired man resting on a pair of crutches nodded to him, and Clint politely gestured back.

"I'm starting to think you guys don't want me to—"

Clint stopped dead in his tracks. He quickly walked back through his immediate memories, finally registering the man he had just greeted in passing. He swivelled slowly, his face unreadable, facing the crippled man once again. The young man with shining silver hair.

The face of one Pietro Maximoff smiled back.

"Hey."

It was as he purposefully drew in a sharp breath that Clint realised he had forgotten to breathe.

"You didn't see that coming," the young man chuckled, his eyes gleaming.

"Shut up and hug me, you little shit," Clint growled, pulling Pietro into a tight embrace, squeezing out a grunt from the young man. The recipient didn't protest; instead, he closed his eyes, savouring the feeling of someone else who had missed him dearly. "You know, I have someone back home who's gonna wanna meet you."

"Is it little Pietro?" the young man asked hopefully.

"Nathaniel, actually," Clint replied, pulling back. "Pietro's his middle name."

Pietro stuck out his bottom lip.

"I took several bullets for you, and you didn't even give me a first name?"

"Only if you stayed dead," Clint grinned. "Speaking of which…" He gestured to Pietro's body wildly. "How?

"Hell didn't want me," Pietro smiled. Clint shrugged.

"Dark, but plausible."

"Trust me, Clint," Bruce interjected, having been content to merely spectate until now, "it's a long story."

"It always is, isn't it?" Clint sighed.

Bruce gave a hearty laugh, clapping him on the back.

"I guess so."

"Hey, as long as Thanos stays as ashes, I'm happy," Clint conceding, his palm facing upwards. "Who else knows?"

"Just us, Wanda, Sam and Bucky," Bruce answered. Clint's eyes widened.

"Really?" he asked. The pair nodded, causing his grin to widen and an evil glint to appear in his eyes. "Oh my god. Tell no one. Not even them."

"What for?" Bruce squinted in bewilderment.

"Payback!" Clint exclaimed. "I can finally surprise them for a change!"

"Who's 'them'?" Pietro asked, causing Clint to fluster.

"Oh, you know, just friends of mine," he replied in a tone he hoped sounded aloof. "You don't know them."

"It's Rogers and Romanoff, isn't it?"

The archer's eyes widened, and he quickly scoffed.

"No… What? That's…" Seeing that Pietro was unconvinced, he sighed. "Yeah."

Pietro grinned smugly, nodding.

"Barnes told me."

"Of course he did, little snitch." Clint gave him a pointed glare. "You'd better not tell anyone else, they deserve a bit of privacy."

"No, I won't," he quickly responded, crossing his heart with one hand. "I promise."

Clint smiled, placing a warm hand on his shoulder, his smile returning in earnest.

"It's good to have you back, kid."

Pietro smiled back, his eyes sparkling.

"It's good to be back."


	10. Chapter 10

Today was the day. The day the Avengers were to assemble once again. Or at least that was the plan

Sam had sent out a message to all invitees a few days before telling them all the same thing: Wednesday, 10 o'clock, New Avengers Compound. Training for active members will begin.

Now all he had to do was wait.

A small part of him acknowledged the genuine possibility that no one would arrive, that of all the people they invited none would show up. Not that it would be too bad. With Pietro up and about, raring to go, that brought their number to five. When it came down it, five Avengers were better than none.

Still, it was the principle. Sam was the one who promised to lead the team; if he turned out an empty house it would reflect just as much on him. Their lack of confidence wouldn't just be in the group itself, it would be in him. Sam knew that he shouldn't take it too personally - they all would have their reasons for not showing up - but he couldn't help the creeping feeling of inadequacy. This would the first time he made a proper appearance as the new Captain America, after all. The previously grey and red suit he used to carry on missions had been given a more patriotic makeover, combining the best parts of Steve's old uniform with his own unique twist.

The first time he saw the new design, Sam couldn't help the tear that came to his eye. Not that he would ever admit to crying, especially not to Barnes. Although, Barnes looked pretty wistful himself, seeing the red, white and blue again.

Sam would definitely have to get used to throwing the shield mid-air, through - god, that was difficult. He thought, watching Steve throw it so effortlessly, that it had a mind of its own in a way, like a computer guidance system that helped him out a little. No, turns out that son of a bitch worked out all the angles on the fly. And now - Sam cringed at his own pun - so would he.

Putting on the suit, Sam remembered feeling surprisingly dignified, considering he was now all the colours of a July 4th party. He reckoned he would look far more respectable with the Avengers behind him, all in their equally colourful outfits. If the Avengers ever decided to show, that is…

His anxieties were shattered as he heard the familiar loud horn of an ugly, brown van. The vehicle made its way up through the drive of the compound, stopping just in front of him. The doors slid open, and from inside clambered out a welcome sight. Both Scott Lang and Hope Van Dyne were smiling courteously as they climbed the steps towards him.

"Are we late?" Scott greeted, shaking his hand, taking a moment to admire Sam's new armour.

"Actually, you're both right on time," he smiled. "It's good to have you."

"We thought it was about time we stepped up," Hope added. "We couldn't stay in San Francisco forever.

"I hope you don't mind," Scott continued, "we brought a stray."

"A stray?" Same asked before he noticed movement from within the van.

A third person shuffled awkwardly out of the vehicle, her lengthy, black hair hiding her tan face, her eyes dark, alert and striking. Scott turned to her, gesturing for her to follow them.

"Her name is Ava," Scott explained. The woman nodded in affirmation.

"Ava Starr," she clarified hesitantly.

"She's a… friend of our's," Hope said carefully, tipping Sam off to exactly what kind of friend she really was. "I know this is short notice, but—"

"Relax," Sam called. "We're used to short notice, comes with the job." He took a few steps towards the new recruit, who stared at him with wide eyes. "So, Ava- can I call you Ava? What makes you wanna be an Avenger?"

"Because I've made a lot of mistakes," she replied solemnly, in a way that reminded Sam far too much of the first time he properly met Barnes, "and I've hurt a lot of people. I want to be more than that if you'll have me."

Sam examined her for a moment.

"So," he hummed, "do you shrink too?"

She smirked, laughing nervously.

"No. I phase."

Sam raised his eyebrow.

"Phase?"

"Through objects." She shrugged. "Like a ghost."

"I'm sure we can work with that," Sam smiled, clapping her on the shoulder. "Welcome to the team. Try to make friends, it's easier than you think."

She gazed curiously at him.

"Just like that?"

He nodded.

"Yep," he nodded. "Oh, before I forget, we're gonna need a codename."

"Codename?"

"You know like 'Falcon', 'Ant-Man', 'Wasp'. What do I call you on the field? "

"I used to be called 'Ghost'," she murmured.

"And what do _you_ wanna be called?"

She pondered for a while, staring at the ground.

"'Silhouette'," she offered. A bit of a mouthful, maybe a bit on the nose, but it was a good start.

"We'll work on it," he grinned.

He turned to the others, addressing them as a group.

"Go on," he gestured to the compound. "Get yourselves comfortable."

Before any of them could react, the sound of a roaring engine pierced the scene, a shadow passing over them. Sam raised his head, gazing up into the belly of a giant spaceship, the same one that he had seen during his trip to New Asgard. He smiled, realising precisely who was onboard.

Sure enough, the ship's bowels opened, and a small figure launched themselves out, landing on the grassy plains beside the building. She was carrying a small bundle, wrapped in blue material.

He smiled, adding one more to his growing mental list.

The face of Brunnhilde, the last Valkyrie, peered up at him as she strutted across the lawn, her sword and armour wrapped in the blue fabric of her cape.

"Wilson," she called, smirking amicably.

"Look who decided to show up," he shouted back, crossing this arms.

"I'm only doing this to prove you wrong."

"You're here, aren't you? That's good enough for me."

The pair looked each other up and down, before offering one hand and shaking.

"Thanks for inviting me," she said sincerely.

A shout from the treetops at the border of the compound interrupted whatever Sam was going to reply. Soon, the sight of a lithe young man, clothed in a red and black bodysuit, swinging past the security barrier accompanied the sound. A pair of big, white eyes stared at the pair as he landed on a nearby railing, balancing perfectly.

"Sorry," he gasped, "got here as soon as I could. Had to ride a truck for some of the way. The driver wasn't a fan."

"Hey, kid," Sam greeted. "How was the field trip?"

Parker nodded behind the mask.

"Eventful," he replied cryptically. "But, look, I got a new suit!"

He stood up, his limbs stretched outward, showing off his new costume, so similar to the one for the airport, but the black worked well in place of the blue.

"Looks good on you, man," Sam nodded.

"Thanks, dude." Sam could hear his smile. Noticing the Asgardian by Sam's side for the first time, Parker lit up behind his mask, his lenses widening comically. "Hey, it's you!"

"It is," Brunnhilde grinned. "Spider-Boy."

Parker's head turned silently towards Sam, who was calmly studying the architecture of a nearby building.

"Did _you_ have something to do with this?" The mask squinted.

"I've no idea what you're talking about."

Shaking his head, Parker readdressed Brunnhilde.

"So, are you gonna be one of the Avengers?"

"That's the plan," she shrugged.

"Sweet!" he pumped his fist. "I can't wait to start working with you, ma'am."

"Call me Brunnhilde," she offered, smirking, "Spider-Boy."

"Spider-_Man_," he tried correcting her. She merely shook her head.

"Pretty sure it's Spider-Boy."

He sighed.

"If you say so…" he murmured, before quickly adding, "_your Majesty_."

She froze, rounding on him.

"What did you call me?"

He recoiled, his palms held high.

"Nothing!"

She grinned, chuckling heartily, clapping him on the arm.

"That's what I thought."

Parker relaxed, vaulting off of the railing onto the steps, following her into the facility, leaving Sam with a renewed sense of optimism. The only ones missing were now T'Challa and Strange, the people he knew were the least likely to show - T'Challa had duties of his own, running a country and all, and Strange… well, Strange was probably too busy doing wizard shit. Whatever that was.

Regardless, the sensation of marching through the doors of the compound, seeing the gathered arrivals all chatting amongst themselves, was one that filled Sam with pride. He scanned each of the faces, counting them as five new members, practically an entire team. Adding them along with the five that he already had made the new Avengers team a healthy ten. Ten of the Earth's mightiest heroes, ready to protect the planet.

Sam could only hope that Steve would have been proud.

He smiled. Then he paused. Thinking of Steve reminded him that each of them would have to be trained, briefed and guided, all in their own ways. That was only going to take time. A lot of time. Time that they were currently wasting.

Scanning the room, Sam noticed that they were missing only four more people: the locals, in fact. Before he had a chance to call for them, a streak of blue came rushing into the room.

"Sorry, sorry," Pietro greeted, wearing his new streamlined running armour. "I was getting dressed."

"It's ten o'clock, man," Sam scolded.

"Yeah, and I was dead a few weeks ago," Pietro smirked. "Cut me some slack."

"That's not gonna work every time, kid."

Pietro nodded slowly.

"Oh, I think it's still got some mileage in it," he replied slyly.

Sam merely shook his head.

"Where's Wanda?"

Pietro shrugged as if to ask why he would know.

"Where's Barnes?"

"Same difference," Sam murmured to himself, glancing around the facility for the pair in question.

"There they are," he heard Pietro say, and by the time Sam turned to ask where, a trail of blue light was all that remained, leading him to a flight of stairs the speedster had sprinted up only seconds before.

At the top of the stairwell, arm in arm, looking slightly bemused, stood Bucky and Wanda, kitted out in their uniforms.

"Hey, you two," Pietro called, appearing in front of them, "you gonna join us? Today, perhaps?"

Wanda rolled her eyes.

"Give us a second," she urged. "Not all of us can run faster than a train."

Pietro sighed, tutting at her apparent tardiness, but still retreated back down the staircase, leaving the two Avengers alone once again.

"Sorry," she said to the man on her arm, who smiled.

"It's fine," he replied, "I had to look after Steve for most of my childhood. I have an idea about how annoying siblings can be."

"I can't complain," she murmured. "At least he cares."

The couple gazed out over the railing of the stairwell, seeing the gathered group new recruits.

"What do you know," Bucky noted, "this is starting to look like a team."

"Hmm," Wanda hummed, gazing out onto the scene, her head resting on his shoulder. "They'll need some work."

"We all do," Bucky replied sagely.

Wanda could only nod in agreement. Her gaze fell to Pietro, who was back to winding up Sam, skipping around him to entertain himself. His beaming face sent a surge of relief through her, thanking any higher power responsible for his lightning recovery. Not a month ago he was a thin, weary shadow of himself. Now, his muscles were healed, the colour in his face had returned, and his hair - now having been subjected to several thorough washes - was shining as it used to. Not only that but the way he seemed so comfortable in his new uniform, standing side by side with Captain America, was a stark contrast to only a few weeks ago.

Wanda remembered the day he was cleared to walk by himself again. It was the same day she caught him packing a bag of what little possessions he had left.

"You're going to stay with them, aren't you?" he asked her after she confronted him about the open suitcase.

"Why wouldn't I?" she retorted.

"I just thought, after all that's happened to you, you'd want to get away from it all."

"Get away from it all?" she parroted, crossing her arms. "You mean like a vacation?"

"I meant leaving," he replied, "and not coming back."

She stared at him, her brow furrowed.

"Is that what you want me to do?"

He sighed in frustration.

"Wanda, I just want what's best or you," he said, taking a step closer to her. "You know? As you brother?"

"So, you want me to run away?"

He shrugged.

"It's what I'm planning to do."

He flinched, noting her face, caught somewhere between anger, sadness and disgust.

"Wanda, I was lucky," he explained, holding her arms, forcing her to look him in the eye. "The next time, I might not be. And you might not be too. I know what happened to Vision. You think I could live with myself if that happened to you?"

She waved her hands casually. A shield of red light pried his hands away from her biceps.

"I'm more than capable of protecting myself," she seethed. Pietro shook his head, his eyes staring into nothing.

"I thought that as well."

Wanda frowned. She could count the few times when she had seen her brother express real fear or anxiety. Usually his cavalier attitude to pretty much everything was as much for him as it much for her. It helped make her feel safe, at a time when nothing was guaranteed for them. Now, after three years of surviving without him - thriving, even - a sombre, unspoken truth was that she didn't necessarily need her brother anymore, not like she used to. And that was clearly weighing heavily on him.

"Pietro…" she sighed. She reached forward, grasping him in a tight, familiar hug. "I can't just leave them. There are people out there who need me. I made a commitment, to Sam, to James, to the team. I can't go back on that, not now."

She felt him nod.

"I see."

She leaned back, staring at him intently.

"You can stay," she promised. His eyes widened. "We'd be happy to have you." He still seemed unconvinced, his body naturally stiff in her arms. "Pietro, you want me to be safe? Then fight with me. Help me."

By the sudden shift in his posture, the new-found purpose in his eye, Wanda confident she had hammered the point home.

And so, Pietro stayed. He was reluctant at first, shifting from day to day; she could sense his anxiety, the reflex urge to run and not stop. Surprisingly, it only took a few days to fully convince him that he belonged as one of the Avengers - if she could pinpoint the exact moment he decided to stay, it was when he was shown his brand new suit. It was a beautiful thing, a combination of blue and silver so similar to his old tracksuit, except this design had an under armour and padding on the outside. They were also assured that this version was bulletproof.

Pietro would never let anyone hear it from him, but he fell in love with the suit. Every time he wore it, Wanda could feel a rush of pride flood through his brain. It was enough to make her grin, every single time. He wasn't perfect, by no measure. There were plenty of insecurities still left lurking around in that head of his, but that was okay. Because, just as James said, they all needed some work. Speaking of which…

Wanda bringing herself out of her musings, turned to the man on her arm, squeezing to grab his attention.

"I was thinking we start tonight," she whispered. James' eyebrows flew up in surprise

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"Absolutely," she nodded, causing him to straighten up.

"Alright," he replied, gazing straight ahead as if to keep himself composed. A splash of red sprinkled his cheeks, blossoming into a light blush that made Wanda smirk. A small idea planted itself in her head. A very, very dangerous scheme, indeed. She reached up, placing her lips to his cheek in a light, teasing kiss. His eyes widened, his face glowing red. "What was that for?"

"Just a reminder," she chirped into his ear.

"Of what?"

She unravelled her arm, striding ahead of him, looking back over her shoulder to smirk.

"I think you know," she whispered. His jaw tightened, glaring at her.

"How am I suppose to concentrate now?" he growled.

"How indeed?" she shrugged. He laughed.

"You have no idea what you do to me, doll."

She flashed him an intense look that fixed him to the spot. Raising an eyebrow, she stepped just out of his reach, her lips parted ever so slightly. She couldn't have been more provocative if she tried.

"Oh, I think I do." Her hands glowed, propelling her upwards. "Come on, we have newbies to train."

And with that, she pushed herself over the guard rail, gliding gently towards the new recruits, with all the grace and poise of an angel. At least, that was what she looked like to James. It was amazing how much control she had over him, and her eyes never showed a hint of red. It was only as he descended the steps, into the central atrium that he realised what had just happened.

That was flirting. Wanda was _flirting_ with him. She was looking at him in a way he had never seen her look at anyone before, especially not him. He didn't know that Wanda knew how to flirt, let alone be that good at it. And now, the two of them would be spending long, intimate nights together. Regularly, in fact. Of course, he knew that all they would be doing was for therapeutic purposes only, completely platonic. Or so he thought, because if she was ready to take their relationship in that fact direction, or at least hinting that she was considering it…

James couldn't help the wide, dumb smile that appeared on his face.

"You alright, there?" Sam asked, nothing his usually stoic friend sporting a manic grin. A grin that vanished as soon as he noticed Sam's presence.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Bucky quickly schooled himself. "Absolutely fine."

"Right…"

Bucky coughed audibly.

"You ready, bud?" he asked, shifting attention towards the gathered crowd of heroes. He spotted Rhodey, enveloped in his War Machine armour, who nodded to him, signalling that the group was ready to begin. Sam inhaled.

"Ready as I'll ever be." He adjusted his stance, standing tall, gripping his gleaming shield to his side. He smirked eagerly, gearing himself up for his big moment. He glanced at Bucky, who was smiling warmly at him. "I've always wanted to do this." He took a step forward. "AVENGERS…"

The room fell silent. All eyes fell upon him expectantly. Sam felt his heart swell, remembering the sight of Steve, Natasha just behind him, speaking the same mantra years ago. Now it was his turn, his time. Sam was glad he had survived to see it.

He exhaled, pausing for dramatic effect.

"AS-"

"ASSEMBLE!" Bucky shouted from beside him, prompting a cheer to erupt throughout the room. Sam's face fell. He swivelled, revealing Bucky's shit-eating grin. "God, you're right, that feels awesome!"

Sam smiled.

"Barnes."

"Yes, Captain?"

Sam placed a warm hand on Barnes' shoulder, staring neutrally at him.

"Run."

**THE END**

**A/N: Yes, this is the end of this story, but don't worry, I already have a lot planned. My next story will focUs on Wanda and Bucky's therapy, as welL as them slowly falling for each other. I also have a sToRy planned where a certain team frOm the future turn up to help the Avengers save the day, and yes, it will include a certaiN character many people have been asking for...**

**For now, I shall be taking a break to Write it all, so I won't be updatIng for a whiLe. If you want to be notified when those two stories are coming out, feeL free the follow me.**

**This isn't the end, meRely the completion of another episode, as it were. I hopE you all like my new line-up for the Team. It's fairly big compared to the Usual number of six, but then again, with so many awesome characters around in the MCU, I couldn't keep the numbeR so low! I'm pretty certaiN it will look very different from the one in the next Avengers film, but it's my story, so my rules.**

**My choice to include Ava is probably pretty controverSial, but I didn't want to just gO with the obvious. Besides, I see her having a very interesting redemption arc, and her being given the opportunity to do some good will Only lead to some entertaining team dyNamics.**

**Anyway, that's all I've got time for. Thank you so much for all your support, I hope you've all enjoyed reading. I'll see you all next time.**


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